


The Engineer and the Ingénu

by Icarus_Isambard



Series: Adventures in Engineering [1]
Category: Guild Wars 2 (Video Game)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Angst, Asura (Guild Wars), Camaraderie, Charr (Guild Wars), Dark Comedy, Developing Friendships, Divinity's Reach (Guild Wars), Double Entendre, Draft Dodger, Engineers, Fluff, Fort Salma, Gen, Humor, Hurt/Comfort, Mad Science, Military Training, Minor Canonical Character(s), Origin Story, Originally Posted on FanFiction.Net, Prison, Queensdale Train, Video Game Mechanics, bawdy songs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-04
Updated: 2019-09-09
Packaged: 2020-10-09 21:21:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 33,723
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20516618
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Icarus_Isambard/pseuds/Icarus_Isambard
Summary: When his attempt to dodge the Seraph draft leads to a black eye and an embarrassing arrest in a moa shed, 18-year-old Ffeldy will be lucky to get a job as apprentice armorer in the Mists. In a series of misadventures proving Ffeldy does NOT have what it takes to be fighter, mage, or thief, his ineptitude catches the eye of an asuran engineer in need of a suitable test subject.(Originally posted at FFN)





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This work was originally posted at FanFiction.Net starting in 2014, and serialized over a few years. I've decided to add it here for your viewing pleasure, and I'm currently working on a sequel set in the Heart of Thorns expansion, which I'll plan to cross-post here soon, too. My goal is to provide entertaining stories with humor, heart, and a bit of darkness. If I've succeeded in giving you the feelz or making you laugh, please let me know. Thanks! Happy reading.
> 
> ~I.I.~

_Oh, Melandru wears a skirt of leaves and carries a rake and hoe,_

_She dances all about our fields and sings for the crops to grow._

_Her skirts come tumbling off each fall when our harvests and prayers flow free,_

_But easy lad—don’t jump ahead—‘cause her bottom half’s made of tree._

_\- old Seraph marching song, currently banned_

On the eve of his eighteenth birthday, the day before he was to report for his compulsive military service in Divinity’s Reach, Ffeldy ran away. Two hours after the recruitment sergeant reported him absent, a farmer in the Kessex Hills went to feed his moa flock, found Ffeldy hunkering in a shed, and reported him to the authorities. Ten minutes after that, Seraph from the nearest fort arrived. Ffeldy was knocked soundly on the head, apprehended, and led away with his wrists bound.

“Happy birthday, you ingrate,” growled the farmer. Jagged scars lined his face and hands.

“And what kind of soldier do you think you are, kneeling in moa-dirt with your hands over your face, lad?” asked one of the guards as he led Ffeldy past the farmer, the farmer’s wife, and their six children who had all run over to watch and laugh and throw bits of dandelion and moa-dirt.

“I’m not fit for soldiering, I’ll be terrible at it, and I don’t see why I should march off when plenty of other lads’d be there in my place in a second,” mumbled Ffeldy. “Besides, I’m a conscientious objector.” He’d been socked in the eye, which was starting to swell and he couldn’t see out of it very well. He licked metal-tasting moisture from his lip. Maybe his nose was bleeding. He couldn’t check because his hands were tied behind his back.

“Heh, next he’ll be telling us that the farmer knew elemental magic and rooted his feet to the ground or turned him to stone or some-such,” said the second guard. In fact, the farmer had indeed used minor earth-magic to root Ffeldy’s feet to the ground when he’d first spotted him, and applied a stony veneer to his shins to keep him long enough for the Seraph to arrive.

“Aye, and only a complete skritt-brain doesn’t run for the hills and lets himself be captured. You had a ten minute head-start, lad. But Queen Jennah needs her soldiers, and you’ll make as good a meat shield as any. Though you’re a scrawny one. Don’t fear. We’ll just have to thicken you up a bit first.”

The guards marched Ffeldy along the old outpost road, resting only to dismantle the occasional centaur spike trap. The sun shone on the green hills, and at first Ffeldy was relieved to be free from the suffocating moa-stink of the shed. But then the fields gave way to scattered timber-and-wattle cottages. People came to the doors of their homes to see the little procession, and kids ran up to the front gate, and one well-borne looking woman in fancy fish-scale armor spat in the dust as Ffeldy was marched by. Even disregarding their prisoner, who was still smeared with moa-dirt and dressed in tawdry dirt-colored clothes made of canvas and old split leather, the two guards by themselves were a sight to behold.

Ffeldy remembered when he was the age of these children watching from the roadside, and used to watch the Seraph pass by his own front gate in Claypool. They always wore matching burnished breastplates and golden helmets and greaves that clattered as they walked. Each soldier had a sword and scabbard, and a shield shaped like a golden wing on one arm. In battle, Ffeldy thought a Seraph probably looked like that hero from the poem his mother recited sometimes, the one who transformed herself halfway into an eagle.

“Come, lad,” said the Seraph marching at Ffeldy’s left elbow. “Why would you not want to be one of us? Aye, you are one of the worst scrappers I’ve seen yet, but our drill captain can batter fighting know-how into the thickest of skulls. Even yours, I imagine, though I don’t envy him the task.”

“Sure, sure,” said the Seraph on Ffeldy’s right. “You may not live to be an old man in the army, but they ensure you have a nice enough few years. Or months. Wine, decent food, half an egg-shell full of hard spirits twice a week, the odd brothel permission slip. Old age isn’t as nice as it’s made out to be.”

“I know about soldiering,” mumbled Ffeldy.

“What’s that, young meat shield?” said the left Seraph.

“My Da’ was a soldier. He was killed by centaurs when I was seven. Five of my brothers were drafted. Only one still writes home to Ma. And I’m the youngest.”

“Well,” said the rightmost Seraph in a reassuring voice, “at least your ma has your sisters at home.”

Ffeldy didn’t mention that he only had one sister, and she was in the Order of Whispers, whatever that was. And since the Order was usually up to some sort of illegal something-or-other, which was all Ffeldy knew about it anyways, he kept his mouth shut. Besides, she had seemed very eager to leave home two years ago and hadn’t ever seemed to like him much.

“And what did you think you were going to do after you ran away?” asked the left Seraph, giving Ffeldy’s shoulder a shake. “Live off the land until an Ettin dragged you into its cave and lived off you instead?”

“I could be a tinkerer. Or…a merchant, maybe. Or if I could prove my skill I could repair armor in the Eternal Battle Grounds. There’s lots of need for that sort of thing there. Not everyone has to be a fighter. Do they?”

The two Seraph ignored his rhetorical question, though he hadn’t meant for it to sound so rhetorical.

“Methinks the lad is full of so much putrid essence. We should render him down and sell him for good coin at the trading post. What about these objects you were carrying, eh lad? What exactly would an armor repairman be wanting with a set of _these_?” The rightmost Seraph released Ffeldy’s elbow and held up three small multi-colored crocheted sacks. “Are you a juggler, boy? Running off to the circus?” The soldier tossed the three sacks and caught them again—actually beanbags that Ffeldy had made himself by filling small satchels with dried beans and stitched closed.

“I was not going to join the circus.” He could tell that his face was hot with embarrassment and he prayed that the civilians they passed couldn’t hear the conversation. The Seraph with the beanbags tried to juggle and managed a few bad tosses and catches before one bag went soaring out of control and hit Ffeldy in his already swollen eye. Ffeldy’s knees buckled and, with his hands tied, he couldn’t catch himself before collapsing forward onto his face. The second Seraph should have caught him, but he was doubled up and helpless with laughter at the first Seraph’s antics. Ffeldy struggled to stand, but before he could stumble away into someone’s cow pasture and escape, the Seraph had him by the elbows again.

“Don’t look so shamefaced,” said the Seraph who resumed his position on Ffeldy’s right. “One out of three people we catch trying to desert are ‘running off to the circus.’ Seems a popular fantasy with the youngsters. Isn’t that right, Melbus?”

“Aye, and if it’s not the circus, it’s finding their real parents or somesuch. Retrieving the body of a lost brother—“

“Lost sister, Melbus. It’s always the sister.”

“Aye, sister. Odd thing, that.”

The Seraph fell silent for a while, only the sound of the gravel scuffling under their boots reminding Ffeldy that he wasn’t alone. Then Melbus piped up.

“Well, lad, just be glad you’re not in the Grove and we’re not a stand of those Sylvari plant people.”

“Why is that, Melbus?” asked the rightmost man when Ffeldy didn’t rise to the bait.

“Running around with those sacks of beans? The Sylvari’d dig your feet in the ground like a tree and set their fernhounds on you for them sacks of beans. ‘Trafficking of minors’ is what they’d call it.”

The Seraph didn’t stop laughing until they delivered Ffeldy to the captain of the guard inside the sun-bleached stone walls of Fort Salma.


	2. Chapter 2

_Well human lads, and lasses too, were always meant for war,_

_But if you like art and science and such, take a lesson from old Malchor._

_As sculptor he, per Dwayna’s whim, gave years of his hands and mind,_

_To sculpt six likenesses of the gods—his thanks? Dwayna made him blind._

_\- old Seraph marching song, currently banned_

Instead of formal introductions, the sergeant of the night guard had Ffeldy locked in a cell for the night, to “discourage nighttime steeplechases” as she put it. The cell was really more like a cleaning closet. It was dark, and smelled of silver polish and saddle soap. And it was already occupied.

“The lieutenant will see you lot in the morning for a bit of discipline, then you’ll be sent along to Divinity’s Reach,” said the sergeant of the guard as she shoved Ffeldy inside. “Try not to eat each other alive before dawn. As you were, then.” The door closed, then opened just a crack. “Oh, and young man, the lieutenant won’t mind if I return these to you,” said the sergeant, and placed the three bags of dried beans in Ffeldy’s hand. “Seeing you probably couldn’t assault no guards, nor harm yourself with them.”

“Uh…thank y—“ Began Ffeldy, but the door shut again, this time for good.

“Ah,” said a treacley male voice in the gloom. “A green stick of a lad, is it? And with three satchels, no less. Hand them over, let’s have a look.”

Ffeldy tried to tuck the bags away, then realized one of them was already missing. Beans rattled somewhere off to his left, then he heard a ripping sound as if the seam had been torn.

“Atty, let’s have a light, shall we? And see how rich the lad is.”

“Very well,” said an unenthused female voice. “But I can’t hold a light for very long. I’ll have to use—what is this? A dust rag on a stick?—since they confiscated my scepter.”

A strand of blue electricity appeared in the middle of the room. It cast just enough light for Ffeldy to make out the sharp, mustached face of the man and the tall, dark-skinned woman sitting beside him on an up-turned rinse bucket.

“Oh Grenth’s middle finger, Atty, the lad must’ve sold his poor mother’s cow for a pile of worthless beans. Be glad you were arrested, boy, or that old mother of yours’d beat you up, down and around the village green for falling for that old con-artist trick. Er…they aren’t magicked beans now, are they?”

“No sir,” said Ffeldy. “No one was ever expanded or shrunken or otherwise assaulted by magics, wanted or no, from that crop of beans.”

“Wait, wait,” said the man. “Atalanta, bring that light closer, I can’t quite make this out. Can you brighten it? Bring out a bit more yellow so I can see? There’s something here mixed in the beans.”

“You know,” said Atalanta, “I should charge you a silver for every spell I cast for your personal use.” But she brightened the light and toned the color anyway.

The man held up a tiny glass disc between his fingers. “Well I’ll be…”

“It’s nothing,” said Ffeldy quickly. “Nothing of value. Just parts of an old telescope I had from my brother, he was a sailor. I couldn’t take it with me—it’s long as my arm—so I salvaged the important bits. The lens, that’s what you’re holding now, sir. Some of the brass fittings are there, an’ in these other bags. I’ll make a better one someday with new parts as I can find them.”

“Atty,” said the man, still studying the bits of glass and metal, “can you test for residual magicks? Curses?”

“I think the Seraph would have detected magical residue if it had been there.”

“Humor me, my apple blossom…”

“I’m no one’s apple blossom, Dominick. Unless blossoming means I plant an apple seed in your gullet and have it grow inside you until a tree bursts out your stomach and ears. I may have that power.” Atalanta looked at Ffeldy and lowered her voice. “I’m sorry about him. He’s just a bitter thief who was caught filching from the Seraph storerooms. Obviously he is not a very good one because he was caught. Isn’t that right, Dominick?”

“I’m not bitter, Atty. When I don’t eat nothing for a few hours I just get…the jitters. Can you just test the lad’s baubles so I can sleep in peace? Please?”

“You’re bitter.” Atalanta held out a hand, and Dominick placed the bits of telescope in her palm. She held the lens to her eye, then blew on it. “It’s a well-crafted lens. There’s some perceivable, uh, doctoring, but only in the scientific sense. No magic here.”

Dominick huffed a sigh of relief. “Thank you, Atty.”

Atalanta held her hands apart and let a twist of white lightning arc between them.“I know it looks like I’m doing what he says,” she said to Ffeldy, who had very much wanted to ask the question but didn’t feel it his place to ask, “but I merely happen to be interested myself in your…baubles. Also, I’ve already reminded Dominick—and now I’m warning you, young friend—that if you touch me or even look at me in a way I deem improper, I may sting you a bolt that can stop your heart. Understood?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Excellent.” She held out her hand for Ffeldy to shake. Well, he hoped she expected a shake. Kissing her hand seemed…dangerous. “You may call me Atty.”

“I’m called Ffeldy, miss.”

She laughed at his hesitation to take her hand. “Then we shall tolerate one another pleasantly until the guard releases us in the morning, shan’t we.”

“Come on, lad,” said Dominick, “stop standing there all awkward-like at the door, making us nervous. Have a seat on this pallet. There’s only the one, but it’s not too lumpy or flat. Here is your satchel, beans and the rest of it. Sorry if I gave you a turn. I had a chap take out a purse once, like he was about to pay me off for holding my knife at his throat, and he threw a handful of magicked blinding dust at my face. Can you believe the nerve? A thief can’t be too careful these days. Anyway. Looking at your dried beans all edible and not at the same time, it’s near torture when you’re as starved as I.”

“Didn’t they give us water? Couldn’t we just cook them up?” said Ffeldy hesitantly as he sat down where Dominick had pointed. “With, uh, Atty’s skill, of course.”

“Not a chance,” said Atalanta. “There’s not enough ventilation in this cell, not even a window. I start even a tiny fireball, and we’ll suffocate in minutes, if not seconds.”

“There is water, though,” said Dominick hopefully. “In that copper pot.”

“But what about that other magic skill from just now?” said Ffeldy. “The lightning? You used that.”

“Electricity isn’t the same as fire.”

Ffeldy tried to listen to his thoughts over the rumbling of his own stomach. “Yes, but…have you ever tried doing anything else with it? Besides lighting up rooms and, beg your pardon, shocking villains like Dominick and myself. I hear the Asura bottle it like fireflies in jar, and get it to work for them like a tamed hive of bees. And sometimes without magic.”

“What,” laughed Dominick, “Did the asura catch lightning by standing out in a thunderstorm holding a jar? How does a Krytan farm lad like yourself know about asura, anyways? You ever even met one?”

“The telescope parts are asura-made, given to me by my sist—my brother the sailor. And I have something else, too.” Ffeldy retrieved one of the other pouches, the green one, and ripped it open. He dug around in the beans with his fingers and drew out a tiny glass orb the size of his thumbnail. On one side of the orb was a small metallic nub. “They say the asura use these for light, but I don’t know how to get the lightning in. I tried shuffling across a bearskin rug with slippers on, and got a nice jolt when I touched the door latch, but nothing happens when I touch this.”

“You,” said Dominick, “have wasted far too much time thinking about useless things. What exactly, uh, were you locked up in here for to begin with?”

“Running from the Seraph recruiters. I’m a conscientious objector.”

“Of course you are, lad. Of course you are.”

“Here. The glass bauble. Let me hold it for a minute,” said Atalanta. Ffeldy handed it to her, and she pinched the metal nub with her thumb and index finger. With a flash, the room lit up so bright that Ffeldy though the roof of the cell had blown off to let in a strong mid-day sun.

“Well now, that certainly is an improvement,” said Dominick slowly.

“I’m barely using any power at all,” said Atalanta. “Remarkable. I’d heard of asuran accomplishments, but chalked them up as exaggerated myth. They and the charr, as I recall, practice something called “science,” which I understand to be a magic rooted in electrical matter and steam. However,” she added in a surly tone, “I think I was happier _not_ being able to see every scar and streak of dirt on your faces. You two look like the lowest of rabble.”

“We _are_ the lowest of rabble.” Dominick had found an old candle holder and was scraping out bits of old tallow candle to chew. “Ffeldy here is country draft dodger and I’m a petty thief caught with stolen potatoes up my shirt. Instead of prison, I volunteered to join the Seraph, see the world, kill things an’ all that. What about you, Atty? You haven’t mentioned your own common crime.”

“That,” said Atalanta, “is because I have committed no crime. The misunderstanding will be realized in the morning. I expect the lieutenant to be most gracious. Until then, you’d be best served to not annoy me, lest you end up with a powerful enemy instead of an ally. Shall I dim the light a bit? That’s better. Though I suppose I’ll be stuck holding this thing for the rest of the evening. Goddess, I am starved through. It’s a shame about those beans. A hot supper would have been ample repayment.”

Ffeldy, meanwhile, scooted toward the glass bulb in Atty’s outstretched hand and knelt before it, studying the way the coil of wire inside glowed like one of the god Balthazar’s fiery hairs. When he touched the glass, it was so hot he cried out and stuck his finger in his mouth.

“By the Six, Atty, how do you stand it?”

“I’m an elementalist. Heat, cold and wet don’t bother me much.”

“The bulb’s construction is most curious,” said Ffeldy, still sucking his finger. “Lighting appears to like metal, it only flows along the metal strand, and I suppose through the copper nub, but not the glass. Though it’s hot as Balthazar’s ba—uh, fingers. You said the water pot was copper? I wonder if we couldn’t heat the water the same as the glass, with the lightning.

“And burn down the building,” growled Dominick. “And ourselves by association, seeing how the door is bolted from without.”

“You _would_ burn down the building if you were as good an elementalist as you are a thief,” said Atalanta. “But I have control over these things. Pass me the kettle, Dom, let’s have a go.”

An hour later they were taking turns eating bean soup out of the pot, passing a wooden ladle back and forth. Once he realized that they would not burn to their deaths by electricity, Dominick became so heartened that he whipped out a potato, an onion, a wafer of unidentifiable dried meat, a vial of Ascalonian seasoning, and even a carrot from nowhere to add to the broth.

“I get why you didn’t want to eat a raw potato and even, maybe that dried…protein paste,” said Atalanta. “But why hold on to the carrot?”

“There was only one,” said Dominick. “I didn’t want you to hear me crunching, as then I’d have to share or be electricutified.”

“I wonder why the Seraph didn’t confiscate all this,” added Ffeldy. “They took my haversack, everything but the beans.”

“Oh, they _thought_ they confiscated my rations,” Dominick said with a grin, “but you don’t confiscate from a thief unless he lets you. And unless you strip-search him first.”

Atalanta and Ffeldy exchanged a glance. Ffeldy tried to shove the ladle into Atty’s hands, but when she zapped him with a small electric shock he thrust the ladle at Dominick instead.

“Oh, you two,” said the thief, then laughed. “You already ate most of it without complaint when you didn’t know the particulars. Doesn’t heat cook out the evil spirits? What are you so anxious about?” He slurped loudly from the ladle. “Ah well, so much the better for me. A thief gets what he wants. Doesn’t even have to steal it sometimes, it gets handed right to him.” And he raised the ladle in salute.


	3. Chapter 3

_Queen Jennah was home when you left -- You’re right_

_Oh Jennah was home when you left -- Right!_

_And Logan was here to my left -- to fight_

_Oh Logan was here to my left -- he left!_

_He left? [beat] You’re right._

_He left. -- You’re right. _

_He left [beat] double-time! -- Right? _

_He left. -- You’re right!_

_~ Seraph call-and-answer marching cadence (currently banned on pain of thumbscrews)_

The next morning at dawn, Seraph guards roused Ffeldy, Atty and Dom with a sharp rapping on the door.

“Up, up you lot. Rise and shine in the name of the Queen! Today’s a big day for you. At attention now!”

Ffeldy clambered unsteadily to his feet, convinced the centaurs must have invaded to have caused such racket. He and Dominick, despite both vowing and attempting to stay awake all night swapping bawdy jokes and tales—in whispers after Atty threatened to turn their mouths to stone—had fallen asleep, each half on, half off the thin straw-filled pallet. Atty had distanced herself and made a nest out of her thick, green cloak, which, as the Seraph clomped up and down the hall, she now shook free of dirt and tossed over her shoulders.

The cell door swung open, and a row of Seraph in impeccable armor awaited them in the corridor. The sergeant from the previous evening stood front and center, holding two coils of rope.

“Von Ffeldy and Dominick Garret. Please step forward and hold out your hands.”

Ffeldy and Dominick exchanged a nervous glance, and stepped forward together. One of the guards bound Ffeldy’s wrists. He winced when the rope slid over the red patches of skin that had rubbed raw on yesterday’s march, and tried to tell himself today would be better because at least his hands were tied in front this time, not behind his back.

“What about her?” whimpered Dominick as the guard tightened his cords. “Aren’t men and women equal in the eyes of the law? Is it because she’ll singe right through your rope that you don’t bind her, too? A metal cable might do, just saying.”

“Quiet, you,” growled the Seraph sergeant. She towered over Ffeldy, who wasn’t exactly short himself, and her muscular arms, what he could see of them, seemed the width of Ffeldy’s calves. When she flicked her finger, her guards roughly dragged Ffeldy and Dominick from the cell and shoved them down the corridor, taking care to bump the captives’ heads on every wall and door-frame. Atalanta followed along behind, serene and unfettered.

When Ffeldy’s head stopped spinning from being knocked around, he found himself standing in ankle-deep muck in a courtyard before a Seraph officer in an intricate set of armor that seemed to have been constructed of bits of an exploded dragon that someone had dipped in silver and soldered together.

“Good morning, delinquents,” said the officer.

“Show some respect,” hissed the sergeant, thwacking Ffeldy and Dominick over their heads with a thick vellum scroll. “Kneel.”

Ffeldy staggered forward from the blow. He bowed his head and dropped to his knees in the muck, which soaked through his leggings, leaving them clammy and cold. From the corner of his eye he saw Dominick do the same. But when he managed to scan the courtyard for Atty without the sergeant noticing, the elementalist had vanished. Maybe she had transformed into a mist and escaped—he’d heard good eles could do that. Did that mean she’d return to rescue two dirty vagabonds? Yes, Ffeldy tried to tell himself, even though every last whisper in his brain told him otherwise.

The sergeant faced the officer and stood at attention. “Lieutenant Gregoire, two prisoners, having engaged in illegal acts according to Krytan law, have been captured, accounted for, and await your gracious inspection.”

“Thank you, Sergeant Delaqua. Please read the charges.”

Delaqua unrolled the scroll and cleared her throat. “One Dominick Garret, accused of fourteen counts of larceny, apprehended at the Wallwatcher camp near barrels of the Queen’s stores, having been found with numerous stolen wares upon his person…” The sergeant droned on in an officious voice, giving a too-thorough account with an unnecessary level of detail. A few of the Seraph guards snickered at the part when a Wallwatcher corporal, suspecting the thief, had noticed a tell-tale potato working its way down one of Dominick’s trouser legs.

“Yes, I get the gist” interrupted Lieutenant Gregoire. “What of the young lad?”

“One Von Ffeldy, accused of draft avoidance and evasion, having failed, upon reaching legal age, to report to the Seraph recruiting sergeant in Claypool…”

Ffeldy’s ears burned as he listened to the account of his transgressions and, worse, when the Seraph all laughed at his shameful showing in the moa shed.

Meanwhile, the lieutenant had drawn his sword. He placed the point under Ffeldy’s chin and tilted it up so that Ffeldy was forced to meet his eyes. Gregoire’s face was grim, his eyes dark under thick brows crisscrossed with battle scars.

“And why do you hate your queen so?” said the lieutenant in a low voice for only Ffeldy to hear. “What has fair Kryta done to you, that you would abandon her to dragons, and undead, and other foul threats?”

“Sir, I never meant to offend Queen Jennah. I would serve her in a different way—“

“You would save your own skin by letting others die in your place.” Lieutenant Gregoire spat. “I know your kind.”

“Others have died already, Sir. My dad and brothers. My ma runs the farm herself—” Ffeldy could feel the tears sliding down his cheeks.

“So you choose to abandon your own mother to the dragons, undead, and foul threats. Ungrateful, stupid lad. You must cut the apron strings and leave her either way, either with honor or with great shame.”

“Lieutenant Gregoire? Sir?” Sergeant Delaqua had finished reading the charges and rolled the vellum back into a tight scroll. “What disciplinary measures would you have us take against the accused?”

The lieutenant took a step back, sword still in hand, and said in a loud voice for the entire Fort Salma to hear, “I pronounce both defendants guilty as charged. For fourteen counts of larceny of the Queen’s stores I hereby sentence Dominick Garret of Nebo Terrace to the stocks, and for no fewer than fourteen rotten tomatoes to be thrown at his head. Thereafter he shall serve the Queen as a Seraph recruit for five years, in lieu of prison.”

Two guards advanced, lifted Dominick by the elbows, and hauled him bodily away. The thief’s dragging heels left two parallel lines in the mud.

“And for the avoidance and evasion of required military service…” continued Gregoire.

Ffeldy’s tongue plastered itself to the roof of his mouth.

“…I hereby sentence Von Ffeldy to kiss the blade of this sword and swear allegiance to Queen and Kryta. Thereafter he shall serve the Queen as a Seraph recruit for the rest of his natural life, in lieu of death on the gibbet.”

Ffeldy’s vision went black, as if someone had snuffed out a candle. When he came to, he was on his hands and knees. The tip of the lieutenant’s sword floated in front of his nose. Ffeldy closed his eyes and pressed his lips to the flat of the blade.

“Repeat after me,” said the lieutenant. “I pledge my life to Queen and Kryta, until my death, so help me Six.”

“I pledge my life to—to Queen and Kryta. Until—until my death. So help me Six.”

Delaqua whacked him again on the head with her vellum scroll. “Say it like you mean it,” she snarled, and stepped aside.

“I pledge my life to Queen and Kryta. Until my death, so help me Six!” Ffeldy shouted.

The lieutenant sheathed his blade with a _shing_. “So help you,” he murmured, then turned away on his heel.

Ffeldy started to rise, but Delaqua pushed him back down. “Not so fast. The Hero of Shaemoor has a few words for you. Be polite and pay your respects.”

One last pair of boots—tall, heeled, flame-colored and feminine—stood before Ffeldy, who felt even more wretched before this fashionable stranger. The Hero removed her glove and offered a hand, dark as caramel.

Ffeldy hesitated, his head spinning with some strange déjà vu, and he leaned towards the hand. As his lips met the fingers a loud crack filled his ears, and a white flash nearly blinded him. His mouth stung and for a moment he thought he’d been on the receiving end of Delaqua’s powerful backhand.

“Gotcha,” said a familiar voice. Ffeldy raised his eyes. Atalanta, decked not in her drab cloak but in a gauzy, flame-colored outfit, winked at him and laughed.

“Atty!”

This time Sergeant Delaqua did deliver Ffeldy a smart cuff. “Is that how you address the Hero of Shaemoor, you cur?”

Atalanta held out her hand again, and Ffeldy instinctively recoiled. “Pledge your allegiance, _cur_,” she said, but Ffeldy could hear the humor in her voice. This time her hand was warm and soft against his mouth, and not quite so electric.

“I pledge my life to Queen and Kryta until my death, so help me Six!” The words came easily to him now, and yet rang heavily in his ears. He spoke, but still couldn’t bring himself to believe. He was a coward, and a fraud.

“Don’t worry,” whispered Atty in his ear. “I work for the captain of the Seraph, Captain Thackeray. He’s very nice. It’s really not that bad.”

“Disciplinary measures are now complete,” pronounced Delaqua. “Von Ffeldy, you may rise.”


	4. Chapter 4

_Flame!_

_The girl dressed in flame!_

_When centaurs invaded and put us to the sword,_

_And no one could help us, not magistrate nor lord,_

_At’lanta sent them packing, putting them—and us—to shame:_

_The Hero of Shaemoor, the girl wielding flame!_

_~excerpt from Shaemoor Inn’s most frequently requested ballad _

The midmorning sun had cleared the battlements by the time Dominick and Ffeldy were allowed to use water from a dolyak trough to rinse the worst of the mud, grime, or in Dominick’s case tomato juice, from their faces and clothes. The Seraph retied their hands, then linked the men together with an arm’s length of rope. Sergeant Delaqua at last deemed them fit for travel and sent for the lieutenant, whom she said would see them off. Ffeldy was surprised to see Atalanta reappear with Lieutenant Gregoire. As the Hero of Shaemoor, she should have had more important things to do.

“Might I inquire,” Atalanta asked Gregoire, “where the two scoundrels are being taken?”

“To Divinity’s Reach, my lady. The Seraph Chief of Recruits will process them and see that they are turned into more…_useful_ members of society.”

“What a coincidence,” said Atty. “I, too, am traveling to Divinity’s Reach to report back to Captain Thackeray. His most recent notion was to have me infiltrate a den of bandits by disguising myself. I suppose it worked a little too well. The Seraph raided the venue and—as I understand it, Captain Thackeray, being busy with bigger Krytan affairs, forgot to tell them that I was not an actual bandit myself. Luckily, I was able to count on your own gracious understanding this morning.”

“Sergeant Delaqua says her sister Marjory has only good things to say about you, my lady.” Lieutenant Gregoire halted a few paces from the prisoners, but only Atalanta held his full attention. He had tucked his helmet under one arm, and his fingers played with the face-shield, absently clicking it up and down. “On behalf of all Seraph,” he said, “I apologize one hundred times for such an oversight. To think that the Hero of Shaemoor had to spend the night locked with a pair of ruffians in a cell. How can such a thing be repaid?”

“Please,” said Atalanta, “think nothing of it. Two bandits are barely noticeable after dealing with an entire den of them.”

“I am pleased to hear it,” replied Gregoire, still flicking his fingers on his helmet. “I hadn’t meant to ask you—I can barely form the words, I’m so mortified by what I’m about to request—but with recent centaur attacks I barely have enough sentries to guard these gates and…would you mind escorting the prisoners yourself to Divinity’s Reach?”

“Escort the prisoners? I?” Atalanta’s nonchalant tone slipped. It was the first time Ffeldy had noticed any lack of confidence in her demeanor. “With perhaps one Seraph guard to…hold the rope, or what have you?”

“I’m sure the Hero of Shaemoor has no need of any Seraph guards.”

Atalanta thumped the butt of her plain wooden staff into the dirt in apparent agitation. “No, of course I need no accompaniment. And Captain Thackeray—“

“—would be most impressed by your initiative,” said Gregoire. “Most impressed, indeed.”

“Yes, lieutenant, I believe he would be.”

“Very well, then. I release the prisoners into your capable hands.” Gregoire thumped his chest in salute. Ffeldy and Dominick bowed to the lieutenant per Sergeant Delaqua’s firm suggestion.

“Come, scoundrels,” bawled Atty, her self-assure tone restored. “Let us report to the capital, Captain and Queen! Forward march!”

Ffeldy lurched forward when a zap of electricity stung his back. The rope attaching his wrists to Dominick’s tightened, forcing the thief to stumble along behind him. They marched through the Fort Salma gate in single file with Ffeldy in the lead and Atalanta falling in behind.

“I bet it’s an act,” whispered Dominick. “She’ll untie us once we round the bend and Delaqua can’t see us anymore.”

And so Ffeldy played the part of despondent prisoner—not a difficult act—but even after the fort had disappeared behind a bend, a dense swamp, and a number of hillocks, Atty still hadn’t broken her act as warden.

“Atty,” whispered Dominick, “the three of us had bonded last night. We’re all common sufferers, don’t you see? You can untie us, surely.”

Atalanta’s voice was as cold as a Shiverpeak winter. “I have a duty. I’ve been chosen for this. Nothing you can say can bend me from it. Nothing.”

As the sun arced overhead, they labored up the side of a steep ridge out of the swamp. Far below, the stout, sharpened logs of a distant garrison looked like a child’s twig fort, and beyond that, a lake glinted like colored glass. Throughout the trek Ffeldy found it difficult to empty his mind of fear. What would his new life be like as a Seraph? Could he really be a fighter? Was it too late for him to learn a few spells, or would he discover some untapped talent as an agile rouge scrapper?

_Thereafter he shall serve the Queen as a Seraph recruit for the rest of his natural life, in lieu of death on the gibbet._

Lieutenant Gregoire’s words echoed in his mind. _Death on the gibbet._ He had committed a capital crime. The Seraph had every right to string him up on a post, but some strange fate had spared him. _For the rest of his natural life._ How much longer did he have left in his natural life, anyway? Months? Days? Stop, he told himself. Stop thinking about it. That way lies madness.

At some point Ffeldy noticed Dominick whistling a tune, a familiar, popular air he had heard back home in Claypool. Maybe music could distract him from those more troubling thoughts. Ffeldy focused on the tune, then joined in by humming. He knew the song had words, too, and tried to remember them.

“What is that?” demanded Atalanta, who still followed along behind. “Enough. Silence. I’ll hear no more of it.”

“The Hero of Shaemoor doesn’t like her own song?” said Dominick in a wry voice. “Or are we that badly out of tune?”

Suddenly the words to the song came flooding back from some far corner of his memory, and Ffeldy belted out the verse:

_Now Atty saw the centaurs attacking_

_And sent us frightened peasants to the inn._

_The sparks from her scepter started crackling, _

_Her rank was Rabbit, but we knew she’d win._

_Even Seraph ran for cover but she still stood tall,_

_She cried, “Watch this giant earth elemental fall!”_

“I didn’t actually say those words,” insisted Atalanta. “It’s all taken out of context. The Seraph never ran. I didn’t either, but…they didn’t exactly give me the chance. Really. It sounds so silly laid out that way in the song. I’m just surprised anyone remembers the words at all.”

Now Dominick joined Ffledy for the next verse.

_Meanwhile the elemental was a’crawling from the ground,_

_With hands as big as windmill blades that knocked our armies down._

_With Logan off at Jennah’s side, seems every fight’s the same: _

_He sends us Shaemoor’s Hero, the girl who wields the flame._

They held the last note until their voices and lungs gave out. A few shocked birds flapped away into the treetops.

“But Logan Thackeray _was_ there, fighting the elemental with me,” said Atalanta. “Or at least, he provided some sort of healing magic. I don’t understand why people make so much fun of him for—“

“Never actually fighting?” interjected Dominick. “Making other people do his work for him? Because he would never do something like, say, abandon Destiny’s Edge because his lady love the Queen was in danger...ow! No lightning, Atty. Unfair.”

“You are the vagabonds, both of you, and I am the hero. I’ll decide when to use lightning, or fire, or stones. And criticizing Captain Thackeray will not be tolerated in my presence. Understood?”

Dominick said nothing. Ffeldy had no wish to get involved in a political discussion, either. He braced himself for any chain lightning that might arc off Dominick, but none came. Instead, a shadow seemed to fall over them, then a steady rain began to fall. Ffeldy pushed wet strands of hair from his eyes. Soon his clothes, and Dominick’s, were soaked, but when he glanced over his shoulder, Atalanta’s getup was as bright, gauzy, and dry as ever. He looked up. A rowboat-sized cloud hovered directly over his and Dominick’s heads, drenching only the pair of them.

“Atty, please,” Ffeldy groaned. “Haven’t we been punished enough?”

“If I hear one more verse of that song, even a single note, I’m calling up a blizzard.”

“Yes, my lady.”

Atty just rolled her eyes. At last the rain slowed to a drizzle, and at last the warm sun filtered through the dissolving cloud. They continued their trek up the side of the mountain, followed a ridge west for a time, then dropped down into another, more narrow valley on the other side. Yet another near-vertical incline awaited them.

“Well Lyssa be praised,” puffed Dominick between labored breaths on the second, even steeper ascent. “It’s a good thing my hands aren’t tied together, or this climbing business would be _really_ difficult. I might not be able to catch myself before plummeting off the edge. I imagine you’d hear me scream for a good four seconds, maybe five, before I hit bottom.”

“I could tie them behind your back instead of in front if you’d like, thief,” growled Atalanta.

That shut Dominick up for a while—until he did indeed stumble and would have fallen from the steep cliff face if Ffeldy, still attached to him by the rope, hadn’t dropped backwards on his rear and jerked Dominick away from the ledge. They both sat huffing and exchanged a sympathetic glance. Atalanta eyed them warily, her arms crossed.

“I suppose,” she said at last, “that we could take an underground shortcut I know of.”

“Shortcut?” echoed Ffeldy.

Dominick added, “So, you’ve been holding out on us, Atty?”

“Holding out?” said Atalanta. “Of course not. It just didn’t seem like a viable alternative until now.”

“Not a ‘viable alternative?’” Dominick nearly shouted. “And I suppose this underground shortcut has fewer ledges where we can plunge to our deaths, or rock faces that might crumble out from under our hands.”

“It has few, if any of those things, yes,” admitted Atalanta.

“So why didn’t we go that way to begin with?”

“Dominick, you focus only on what this alternate route does _not_ have, instead of what it _does_ have.”

“What DOES it have, then?” asked Ffeldy.

Atalanta shrugged as if this were a trifling question. “Trolls,” she said.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Author's Note: The "Hero of Shaemoor" song is based on "The Hero of Canton" from the Firefly series, with some poetic license applied to the meter in the later sections.]


	5. Chapter 5

_Shall I thee to thy rest now croon?_

_For thou shalt breathe thy last quite soon._

_It seems that thou were not immune_

_To my pistole,_

_Expiring troll._

_Have they thee hunted, these killjoys:_

_Mages, knights, hobbledehoys,_

_In steel plate, leather, silken turquoise_

_Camisoles,_

_Expiring troll?_

_~”Ode to an Expiring Troll” by the poet laureate of Divinity’s Reach _

They double-backed and descended the ridge, then traveled up-valley until the escarpment on either side grew sheer, and the flat rock walls seemed to lean in toward each other. Soon they reached the end of the box canyon—the end, that is, but for a small, dark opening framed with timber like the entrance of a mine. A weather-beaten sign tacked to one side was scrawled with a brown substance that may have been dried blood: _Warning Trolls!_

“So this is where you untie us and let Ffeldy and I fend for ourselves if need be,” said Dominick, halting at the sign. “Right, Atty?” His face had turned the color of cold oatmeal.

“Untie you?” said Atalanta. “And risk Captain Thackeray’s ire if—when—you try to run off and I’m forced to, well, ‘maim’ is such a negative word, but you get my meaning. I’d prefer to deliver the two of you whole.”

“Atty, you’re very…_sweet_. But what if—“

Atalanta silenced him with a wave of her hand. “If the circumstances require it, I can singe the ropes.”

“Yes,” said Dominick, “I’m sure you _can_. Doesn’t mean you’ll actually remember in the thick of the fight.”

“Well, if Lyssa holds you in her favor, it won’t come to that, will it? See, Ffeldy knows better than to complain.”

In fact, Ffeldy’s attention had been drawn by distant yellow-greenish lights that swayed deep within the dark, horizontal shaft. “What’s that?” he asked.

“Glow worms,” replied Atalanta, “as big as hounds. But if you don’t bother them, they won’t bother you. Come along, we definitely don’t want to be here after dark.”

“What difference does daylight make in a cave?” asked Dominick, but Atty pulled the rope attached to his and Ffeldy’s hands, and they stumbled along after her, following the purple electric sparks that swarmed from her scepter like fiery gnats. She cast occasional flares to scare off bats or large spiders that ventured too close.

“Now is not the time to be curious,” she insisted when Ffeldy stooped to probe some phosphorescent jelly. It oozed from the corpse of a glowworm that had been struck by one of Atty’s misfired flares. “The cave opens up into a cavern the size of a cathedral, and it’s not a safe place to linger. I’m going to extinguish my light now, since it might start to attract…things.”

She tugged the rope. Ffeldy lurched along after her and the thief. His hands, he noticed, now glowed the faint green of glowworm ichor.

* * *

They advanced into the cavern in a single file—first Atty, who strode with confidence through the darkness (“because the earth and rock guide me underfoot,” she’d claimed in a whisper). Next came Dominick who since entering the cave had clutched one of Atty’s long silk sleeves because she wouldn’t let him touch her shoulder. Ffeldy brought up the rear. He had reeled in the rope that linked him to the thief and followed close enough that Dominick’s pony tail swatted him the face. With Dominick wrenching on the rope, and protruding rocks tripping him at every step, Ffeldy couldn’t keep his glowing hands tucked in his jerkin for long.

BOOM.

A sound like a slammed cell door rang through the cavern, echoing back and forth across a space that must have been far more vast than Ffeldy had imagined.

“We didn’t just get locked in here, did we?” huffed Dominick between hyperventilations.

“Oh no,” whispered Atalanta, serene as a frozen lake. “There are no doors here.”

“Was that the troll?” Ffeldy tried not to let hysteria leach into his words. A feeling of dread seemed to settle on his shoulders, as if someone had just draped him in a chainmail curtain.

“You did read the sign outside. Or can’t you read?”

“I…it said ‘warning trolls.’ There was no comma between the words, and I thought it was warning the trolls against us?” Ffeldy’s attempt at humor did not lighten the situation.

“I think it’s time for you to singe the rope, Atty.” Dominick tugged at his bonds. The line attached to Ffeldy went taut, nearly jerking him off his feet.

“Don’t be silly,” said Atty. “Be still. As long as no one does anything stupid—strikes a light or screams to alert the troll of our presence—we’ll be fine. Assuming the brute doesn’t catch a whiff of the pair of you over its own stench. Unlikely but…not unheard of. Come along. Now may be a good a time to dash.”

The rope tightened again as Dominick sprung forward. Ffeldy tried to follow but caught his toe on a block of stone. As he fell, time seemed to slow enough for him to repeat to himself a dozen times: _I will be as the kerch tree under an axe, I shall fall bravely in utter silence, I shall not alert the troll_…

The cave floor should have knocked the wind quietly from his lungs—at most he should have emitted a soft hiss—but instead, phosphorescent bound hands flailing, he cracked his elbow on a rock and for a moment saw goddess twins Ilya and Lyss dancing circles around his head. They screamed…or was that the sound of his own voice? And then a stone struck his head.

One of Atalanta’s water spells blasted him back into consciousness.

“Atty,” he mumbled, noticing the purple light on the tip of her staff. “Atty, put out the light.”

“No need,” she said coldly, “not when your ruckus and—what is that? Your glowing hands, of all things?—have given up our position. It’s tossing rocks. Now get up and run!”

Ffeldy found that his bonds had been cut. He scrambled to his feet and ran a few paces in the direction Atty pointed, then stopped to look back. He couldn’t see Dominick. Atty still stood, staff alight, facing the blackness.

“What are you doing? Atty!”

“Run, lad. I’m going to fight it.”

“What you mean,” came Dominick’s voice from somewhere off in the gloom, “is that you’re going’ to needle it a few times with some ice slivers and singe it with a few sparks before you realize it’s like fighting a lumbering boulder. Even the Hero of Shaemoor can’t solo a champion troll.”

“I didn’t say I was planning to solo it.” Raising her lighted scepter in one hand, she pulled a dagger from her belt with the other and lobbed it in the direction of Dominick’s voice, as if he were the target dummy at a festival knife-throwing booth. “Take this. But if you try to steal it, I’ll freeze your fingers off.”

Dominick stepped into the cone of Atty’s light, holding the dagger he’d caught between his forefinger and thumb. Blood smeared the glinting blade. “Take back what you said about me earlier.”

Another rock smashed into the ground nearby.

“Idiot. There’s no time!”

“Take it back, Atty.”

“May Balthazar take you! Oh, very well. You’re…not a terrible thief.”

“Atty! Say it.”

She gave a loud sigh. “You’re an excellent thief. Who is constantly in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

“Good enough. I’ll stealth. Catch the troll by surprise. A blow to the heart may not kill him, but it might make a dent.”

Ffeldy watched them argue, unsure of what to do. “Give me a weapon too,” he pleaded over Atty and Dom’s whispered battle plans. “Anything will do.”

Their faces both turned towards him. “Run!” they hissed.

Just then, a huge club made of an entire full-grown tree slammed into the ground, scattering the would-be fighters. Atty’s lightning threaded along the ceiling of the cave, brightening the vast cavern. There stood the cave troll, a scaly, knuckle-dragging creature as tall as a Seraph watchtower.

Ffeldy, who had ducked behind a pile of rubble, could make out what looked like gleaming white sticks on the ground nearby. Bones. They lay scattered about like a morbid human puzzle, along with scraps of armor, a rusty shield and badly corroded sword. Ffeldy armed himself and ran in the direction of the troll. He thought he heard screams—Atalanta and Dominick were indeed screaming at him to not kill himself on his first combat blow—but the voices distorted in his brain, and turned into meaningless noise, like blasts of a hunting horn.

Ffeldy managed to dodge the troll’s club and swung his rusty sword at the creature’s exposed leg. Instead of piercing its hide, the blade bounced off with a clatter.

“You’ll need to put a lot more muscle behind that sword!” shouted Dominick unhelpfully as he somersaulted past, carving figure eights with Atty’s stiletto like a traditional Kessex dancer gone psychotic.

Ffeldy realized how badly he’d chosen his current position when the troll’s club swung at him from one side, while the troll’s rock-like fist swung in from the other.

"Dodge, Ffeldy!” shouted Atty. Ffeldy obeyed, but not fast enough. The troll’s fist clipped his shoulder and dropped him to one knee. He hoisted his shield. The club ricocheted off its convex surface, which surprised Ffeldy by not shattering. The force sent him sliding on his knees. His leggings tore, but he remained more or less alive. So far.

“Your sword!” shouted Dominick, and kicked the ancient blade in Ffeldy’s direction. He hadn’t even realized he’d dropped it. “Behind you! Parry!”

Ffeldy scrambled for the sword and held it in front of his face just as the club swung at his head. This time the blade _did_ shatter, and tiny slivers of metal stung his face and arms. He managed to roll away from the club, barely.

“Stand back,” bellowed Atalanta. “I’m going to hit it with everything I’ve got.”

Ffeldy raised his shield. A thick rope of lightning burst from Atty’s staff, the brightest Ffeldy had seen her wield yet.

“I shall stop its heart!” she cried. The lightning flicked like the tail of a bullwhip, but the troll proved to be more nimble than expected, and stepped neatly aside. The electric whiptail lashed past the troll towards Ffeldy instead. It struck his shield in an explosion of purple sparks. Ffeldy felt a million tiny insects crawling over his skin. They seemed to sear him with pin-prick legs. His scalp grew warm and itchy, the sensation of his hair standing on end. Cords of electricity writhed over the shield like snakes. If he didn’t drop the shield, his own heart would stop.

From the corner of his eye, the troll’s club swung back. Ffeldy planted his feet and swung the shield over his head. He thought he heard Atty’s voice shouting at him not to toss away his last means of protection. Ffeldy launched the shield anyway. It sailed at the troll, struck it once on the head, then reversed course and struck it a second time from behind. It landed not-so-gently in Ffeldy’s hands. Each time the shield had struck, purple lightning snakes had wriggled over the troll’s skin. Now the troll stood rooted. Ffeldy’s ears buzzed, although the shield no longer crackled. It was just an old sheet of metal in his hands.

Ffeldy tried to run, but either his nerves were fried, or perhaps the troll had injured him worse than he’d thought. As he fell forward on his hands, Dominick grabbed one of his arms, and Atty the other. Dominick must have deployed one of his thief tricks because when the troll woke from its stupor, it lumbered past them, head swinging in all directions, but did not see them.

“By the Six,” said Atalanta, crouching by Ffeldy’s side. “I’ve never seen such terrible swordplay in my life.” She lay a hand on his chest. She didn’t shock him for once, but her touch sent a slow tingle through him. The pain in his legs and head lessened, just a bit.

“Your face looks like something an icebrood wolf chewed on and spat out again,” added Dominick. “At least you’re tough. Suicidal, but tough.” He glanced over his shoulder. “Troll up! No time for healing, Atty. Let’s go!”

Atalanta quenched her light source, and all went black. Ffeldy tried to stand but couldn’t find the strength, and he felt his companions drag him away from the _thump thump thumping_ of the troll loping behind them in pursuit. Suddenly his forehead bonked into a wall. Beside him, Atty and Dom grunted and cursed. Ffeldy sank down between them and tried not to think about how many bones he might have broken.

“There should be a door here,” hissed Atalanta.

“Should be? What are you babbling about now, Ele?”

“It’s here, just not…here. I’ll strike a light, and we’ll see it.”

Dominick’s voice rose to a hysterical falsetto. “Light? The troll will see us.”

“Well he just _heard_ you!” This time a melon-sized fireball rose from the top of Atalanta’s staff.

The troll towered over them, a huge boulder in its claws. Atty’s light cast every bump on its scaly skin into harsh relief.

“Leave him!” Dominick grabbed Atalanta’s hand, and as if by some magic, they both disappeared from his sight. The fireball still hovered, but sputtered and shrank like a burned-out candle. Ffeldy sprawled on his back, unable to move. He watched the troll raise the rock over its head. Now he was the only target.

_Dwayna save me_.


	6. Chapter 6

_We asura have a burden_

_Since from the Depths we came,_

_To bring knowledge to the Bookah_

_Though it’s such a losing game._

_Our Alchemic Accelerants _

_Have sown the seeds of science._

_Our Chromatic Converters_

_Helped form a new Alliance._

_The charr have their crude engines_

_Just archaically advanced,_

_And don’t tech-talk with sylvari_

_‘Cause they’re just a bunch of plants, _

_And the norn stand there all cross-eyed _

_While the humans run away—_

_We’d fight the dragons on our own_

_If they’d stay out of the way._

_~ parody by some Bookah* that gained unaccountable and unprecedented popularity in Rata Sum. A properly retabulated musical version is forthcoming._

_*Obviously, since the iambic pedometer fails to squadulously resonate to the harmonic mesotones._

* * *

Did Dwayna hear him? For suddenly crackling luminous spells and glowing auras illuminated the cavern as a hoard of brightly bedecked, mismatched fighters stampeded over and around where Ffeldy lay. A massive feline paw trod on his fingers, and an even larger norn boot caught him in the gut.

“Sorry,” said a deep, gruff voice. “Gotta take my shot at the troll. That’s what you get for starting early.”

“Help…me…” gasped Ffeldy, but the speaker had moved on in the rush. Ffeldy closed his eyes, partly to protect them from dust and gravel kicked up by the advancing army, partly because his still-swollen eye hurt to hold open, but mostly so he didn’t accidentally look up someone’s skirt or tunic and get an eye-full of what they were—or were not—wearing underneath. 

“Is this one sentient? Or dead?” said a penetrating, nasally voice. “Speak up, or you’ll be assigned an ‘expectant’ triage tag.”

“Uh…expectant?”

“As in expectant fatality, medical aid no longer required. Well? Are you sentient? Conscious? You’ll need give it a bit more effort if you don’t want to be assigned the level between ‘algae’ and ‘sea-sponge’ according to Carjj’s Optimal Reconnaissance of Physical State Evidence Scale.”

“Are you…are you speaking in words?” Ffeldy tried to open his eyes, but the one was swollen nearly shut, and the other had teared up from the grit. Someone poured a scorching liquid over his face that fizzed in his eyes, nose, and mouth. He gagged and spluttered, but he found he could see again.

A diminutive being leaned over him, shaking out the last drops of some elixir from an up-turned glass flask. It—she?—pulled a pair of goggles up onto her forehead, revealing huge green eyes. “Assuredly,” she said, grimacing rows of tiny, pointed teeth. “Your brain receptors must have scrambled. Typical fault of human brains, leaking interstitial fluids, squashed fleshy gray matter and so on. Here, bite on this roll of cotton. You might feel some tingling…”

She uncorked a second flask and poured it over his legs. Ffeldy screamed into the cotton she’d stuffed into his mouth, but it came out as a muffled squeak. The elixir effervesced down into his skin, burning like molten lead. The heat faded, and he found he could move again. He sat up, rubbed his head, and pulled the cotton from his mouth.

“Thank you,” Ffeldy managed.

“Ah, a sign of gratitude. I shall upgrade Subject # 342 to ‘quaggan’ level on the CORPSE Scale,” she said. “With luck, the elixir will permeate your neural receptors in the next half hour, and you’ll be your sub-average human self by tomorrow.”

“Are you…are you asura?”

“Subject # 342 appears to be asking questions with obvious answers. I shall be forced to downgrade him to ‘hermit crab’ level. Human, don’t waste your oxygen. The troll is also still sentient and I notice you are down a useable weapon. Why don’t you take this? It’s just one more mechanism I don’t have to carry, thank the Eternal Alchemy.”

“Thank you, uh…”

“Call me Fieuzz. Not my real name, but my parents were pioneers in metalinguistics, and my real name exists on an aural plane unattainable by human ears, never mind vocal cords. Genius first class, college of Dynamics. Here, hold this.” She placed an odd, crystalline pistol in his hands and wrapped his fingers around it. “Take aim, then just trip this lever with your finger. It’s a variant of the standard Phalange-Worked Necroblastic Ruinator.”

“You mean it’s a gun.”

“A crude term, but as you will, young human.” Fieuzz shouldered a long brass rifle attached to her backpack by a hose. “I was going to explain more, but I’ll go against my better instincts and let you try to figure it out yourself. Now take a shot if you can, or you won’t get a share of the reward.”

“Reward?” asked Ffeldy as he scrambled to his feet, but his little benefactor disappeared in the crush of troll-fighting mercenaries. He retrieved his shield, which lay nearby, and loped after them.

The troll still stood amid the swarm of assailants. It had dropped its club and now swung wildly with both rock-like fists, perhaps realizing at last in its pebble-sized brain that it had no chance. Ffeldy almost felt sorry for it, but he leveled the pistol at the troll’s head, squeezed the trigger of the gun—Phalange-Worked Necroblastic Ruinator—and didn’t ease his grip until a charr tapped him on the shoulder with a ground-down claw and told him to relax, the troll had been dead for nearly a minute already.

The fifty-odd victors cheered and broke into various dances, then huddled around something Ffeldy recognized as a wooden chest. He joined them and, after realizing that standing patiently in a queue would not get him to the front, elbowed his way to where a no-nonsense-looking norn with skulls mounted on his shoulders was doling items out, ensuring all participants got a fair share. The norn thrust into his hands a heavy silk pouch, a gaudy-looking war hammer Ffeldy could barely lift, and a pair of reinforced leather breeches with two red stripes down the outside seams. It was finest piece of clothing Ffeldy had ever laid hands on.

As he contemplated finding a secluded place to try them on, Dominick sauntered up.

“Nice threads,” said Dominick in his silky voice now free of hysterics. His hair had fallen from its ponytail and hung loose around his shoulders.

Atalanta, too, had reappeared from the crowd. “It’s a shame you aren’t allowed to wear them, young man.”

“Not allowed?” Ffeldy pressed the breeches to his chest. “But I won them. I mean, it doesn’t make sense that a troll would have these kinds of treasures, but since he did, I’m going to keep ‘em.”

“I’ll excuse you for not having the same…civilized upbringing as I,” said Atalanta. “But you must know that Krytan castes and ranks are very strict. A country lad who nearly stabs himself on every sword he wields does not wear clothing quite that heroic.”

Ffeldy caught Dominick’s eye.

“Don’t look to me for support. Milady is as right as a Seraph with a peg left leg. I’ll buy them off you, though, give you deal you can’t get this side of the Shiverpeaks.”

“Wait,” growled Ffeldy. “The pair of you left me to die on a field of battle, and the first thing you want to ask me when you find me again is if my winnings are for sale? Well they aren’t.”

Atalanta shouldered her staff and pushed her hair from her eyes. “Firstly, we could have done nothing for you if we had both been downed, too—“

“But you never came back neither, did you?”

“Secondly,” continued Atty, “you are now the property of the Queen, and have as much license to personal property as you do to reign in her stead. No, don’t look that way. You may keep your winnings for now, I shan’t touch them. All shall be resolved in Divinity’s Reach.”

“And anyway,” said Dominick with a wink, “all that stuff about us ‘abandoning’ you, it’s worked itself out like an Ascalon cat-fight now, hasn’t it? Mr. Conscientious Objector.”

“Lying on the ground, looking up at a creature that won’t think once afore it smashes your brains in...preservation of the self isn’t the same as that jingoistic Seraph stuff,” said Ffeldy without loosening his grip on his loot. “Who are all these other people—creatures—anyway?” he asked at length.

“Trophy hunters, basically,” said Dominick. “They scour Tyria together for beasts that pay big. I run with them sometimes myself. If you time it right, you can make good coin.”

Atalanta sighed. “What a sad way to live one’s life,” she said. “I could never partake.” But Ffeldy noticed a new gem-encrusted scepter tucked in her belt.

“Ah, there you are, young human,” said a familiar high-pitched voice. “You still respire! Count me as astounded yet pleased. You must remind me later to thank you for aiding, abetting, and otherwise furthering my experiments. But first, come. I must borrow you for a svedberg.”

Ffeldy glanced down. The last time he’d seen Fieuzz—and he hadn’t seen her very well—she’d been leaning over him with her scorching elixirs. Now that he was standing, the top of her faintly tiger-striped head barely reached his chest. She wore sleek gauntlets and shoulder armor made of metal fused with something like glass. An intricate geometric-patterned tunic covered the rest of her. Purple light glowed from points on her chest and shoulders. Ffeldy wondered if the light was made by those little glass baubles.

“Svedberg?” asked Ffeldy. It sounded like a nornish name. “Who? Is he the one who handed out the loot? I thought I could take it. I don’t have to give it back, do I?”

The asura stared up at him, unblinking. “A svedberg,” she said slowly, enunciating each syllable, “is a measurement of time. A very short measurement used to calculate particle sedimentation. One hundred femtoseconds, or ten to the negative thirteenth power seconds, to be exact.”

“It’s…not that big norn’s name then?”

“It was meant as a semi-humorous exaggeration, but I see my words have flown so far beyond your mental capacities that they may well soar through the void of space and find intelligent life long before your species evolves far enough along for your distant progeny to ever laugh.”

“No, no.” Ffeldy put on a smile. “It’s quite funny. Now that you’ve explained it.”

“Don’t patronize me, young human. I only wish to extricate you from your friends so that I may conduct a brief…interview.”

“So who’s the goblin, Ffeldy?” asked Dominick loudly. “Couldn’t you get yourself no Krytan lass?” If the thief’s object had been to attract the attention of every troll-killer in a hundred-yard radius, he succeeded admirably. Faces of every size, hue, and scar-count turned in his direction.

Ffeldy glared at Dom. “Fieuzz is a friend. And since she bothered to risk life and limb to revive me, she’s a better friend than you. We’re going to go talk over there.” He gripped the handle of his new, ludicrously heavy war hammer and dragged it across the floor. “And you can tell Atty to hold on for a svedberg before she binds my hands again and drags me away like a trussed moa.”

Ffeldy and Fieuzz repaired to the far side of the cavern.

“I’m sorry about Dominick,” began Ffeldy, but Fieuzz waved him off.

“I don’t take insults from Bookahs to heart. Those who use crude words to compensate for inferior brainpower strike me as rather…sad individuals. Your own comeback, however, contained a modicum of wit. Nicely parried.”

“Thanks. Better than my sword parry, anyway.”

“Swords. How barbarous,” she said. “That reminds me. The Phalange-Worked Necroblastic Ruinator. You pitched it away at the beginning of the fight, didn’t you?”

“Oh no,” Ffeldy said, and drew the pistol from his belt. “I promised to give it back, and here it is. Thank you.”

“Wait wait wait,” shrilled the asura. “You mean to say that the Phalange-Worked Necroblastic Ruinator is present and intact?”

“Umm…well, it’s right here, isn’t it? I’m not really an expert so maybe I can’t see…” Ffeldy tried to hand it to Fieuzz, but she leaped backwards. Then she pulled a pair of metal tongs from her pack, swallowed loudly, and plucked the pistol from Ffeldy’s outstretched hands.

“Are you certain that you fired this?” she asked dubiously. “You are required to pull this spring-loaded triggering mechanism here with your index finger—"

“I know how a gun works.”

“Well,” said the asura with a huff, “believe me, living on a continent inhabited mostly by Bookahs, I’ve learned to assume that anyone who isn’t a card carrying genius has about as much neuron activity as a sparkfly toadstool, and just hope that in every seventieth case I’m proven wrong.” Still gripping with the tongs, she rotated the pistol slowly and examined it through a small handheld lens. “Yes, yes, there does seem to be some residual sparking, and I can feel noticeable buzzing activity traveling along the pinchers. But it does not appear to have combusted, even partially, as has been so often the case as of late.”

“So it usually gets too hot?” Ffeldy noticed an uncomfortable churning of his stomach acids and glanced at where Atty and Dom were busy haggling with a traveling Black Lion merchant who must have smelled the opportunity for profit from fifty leagues away and come running. Those two had abandoned him once. Surely they’d do it again.

“In actuality,” said Fieuzz, “usually the prototype explodes. Massive fireball. Glass shrapnel impossible to extricate from resulting lesions. You’re a very fortunate young human!”

“Fortunate? _You_ gave this…this deathtrap to _me_. Why? Why would you do that?”

“Science must go forward. _I_ can’t very well pull the trigger myself now, can I? Who would be left to make the adjustments? A massive intellect, years of university, gone in an instant. Senseless waste.” She began narrating to herself in a flat, academic tone. “PWNR has been fired and is intact. Experimental Test Subject 342 is “quaggan level” according to CORPSES. No conflagration witnessed, ETS 342 not operating on full brainpower, growing indignant but not yet violent. I shall attempt a full palpation, administering tranquilizers as needed…”

“So when the test subject is an ignorant human prisoner and sentenced to either death or a life of Seraph duty, then it’s moral,” interrupted Ffeldy. “Is that how you see it?” He tried to brandish his war hammer, but couldn’t lift the stone head higher than his knees.

“Hush, how can I dictate my observations with you babbling on like that? I was not aware of your status as a felon, but knowing it makes my job that much easier. Science requires change, and change requires suffering. I enjoy your suffering less than you do, but it must be done. Be proud of your sacrifice, ETS 342. Even you can help propel technological development forward. Even you.”

At this point Ffeldy wanted nothing more than to rejoin his human acquaintances—no, his _friends, _by Grenth—near the Black Lion trader, and perhaps see if he could sell a few broken claws and a handful of gravel he’d somehow picked up during the battle. He decided to make his decision clear by moving his feet…and discovered too late that he could not. Some white, sticky substance held him in place by the soles of his shoes.

“…ETS 342 has made attempt to escape before palpation could commence; I have deployed the agglutinant bomb.” She switched from her academic voice and addressed him directly. “ETS 342, I can’t reach you up there, I need you down here. Kneel, please.”

“What? No!”

“Then I’ll be forced to make you. You may feel some tingling, ETS 342.”

Something sharp pricked Ffeldy behind the knee. The loss of feeling in his legs was immediate, and they collapsed under him. Now his face was at the same level as hers.

“Fine,” he said. “You win. But my name is Von Ffeldy. All this would be slightly less embarrassing if you’d stop calling me a number.”

“Your cooperation is much appreciated, ETS 342—Von. Or is it Ffeldy? Humans and their confounded double names. Experimental Test Subject 342 is much more concise and easy to remember. Normally I would defer your request, but I made the mistake of taking an elective in Inter-Species Relations during my penultimate year at university, which completely disrupted my natural inclinations.”

“Just call me Ffeldy and have done with it.”

“Ffeldy, excellent.” She replaced her protective goggles with a double-lensed magnifying monocle. Taking out a tiny light on the end of a small wand, she shone it twice into each of his eyes. “Oh, you humans with your proportionately minuscule heads.” She smiled for a moment, as if caught off guard, revealing her saw-like teeth. “If I were the sentimental sort, a charr perhaps, I’d even say you were…adorable.”

“Umm, thank you?”

“Now.” Fieuzz pulled on a pair of gloves made from some stretchy material. “My experiment requires that I perform a palpation, and then you shall be released back into the wild. Don’t be alarmed, it’s completely normal and necessary, just inform me if you experience any crepitus. Right?”

Uhh…” Ffeldy was acutely aware that his face had grown hot, and probably bright red, too. “What exactly is a…palpation? And crepitus?”

Fieuzz gave a short, shrill laugh. “Your brain dove right into the gutter there, didn’t it Ffedly? A perfectly normal symptom in humans. Some day your species may evolve to attain a higher echelon of thought, and then you shall be mercifully free of such distractions and preclusions. Until then, know that I do try to understand your unfortunate instinctual habits and shall work around them as best I can. Crepitus is the grating sound produced by friction between parts of fractured bone.” She held out her gloved hands and slid them over Ffeldy’s scalp, pausing every few inches to squeeze.

“What in the name of the Six Gods are you doing?” Ffeldy tried to shake her off.

“Be still, 342. Tranquilizers are horrendously expensive. I told you, I’m palpating.”

“But you never told me what that is!”

Fieuzz had moved to the side and was now manually inspecting Ffeldy’s neck and spine. “My ears!” she said. “I keep forgetting that you humans have lapses in higher vocabulary as well as in thought. I’m merely checking you over for signs of injury that the side-effects of the Phalange-Worked Necroblastic Ruinator may have inadvertently caused.”

“You could have just asked me. I would have told you that I’m fine.”

“Fine, Ffeldy? Fine? With that contused hematoma near your right eye? Those unevenly dilating pupils? You call that ‘fine?’”

“Between a run-in with the Seraph yesterday, and the cave troll just now, then you and your ‘first aid,’ I wonder if you could blame anything at all on that gun of yours. And before you ask, yes, the limp and the leg bruises and bashed-up thumb are all troll-related.”

“I see,” said Fieuzz. “Well, what about this?” She gave a triumphant smirk and pressed her gloved finger to the tip of Ffeldy’s nose.”

“It’s my nose. And it’s fine.”

“It is indeed your nose, and it is _not_ fine! I’m getting a reading of 54.6 gemmes, type 4 electric, off the end of it, and it’s a well-known fact that a human nose is a reliable source of gemme reading, in the way your carotid artery is a reliable place to find your pulse.”

“And is that…high?”

“High?” shrieked Fieuzz. “High, he asks? Why, a little snub-nose like you shouldn’t register past 0.78 gemmes, type 4 electric. Did you happen to swallow a lightning bolt, perhaps?” To Fieuzz’s credit, she did meanwhile apply a soothing salve to Ffeldy’s black eye.

“Yes, actually. My elementalist friend over there missed a shot at the troll and blasted me—well, my shield—instead.”

“Elementalist, you say? Electric attunement? Remarkable. This shield you mentioned. Did you wield it at the same time as the PWNR?”

“The same. It’s on the ground over there with my gear. You can look at it if you want…”

But the asura didn’t wait for his permission and was already hurrying over to study the shield with her pinchers and mono-scope. Ffeldy decided that his whatever-it-was inspection was over. Luckily the tranquilizer to his legs had begun to wear off. He hoisted himself up onto a rock and rubbed feeling back into his feet.

“So I guess I can write home and tell my mother that I survived my first encounter with an asura?”

“Survived?” cried Fieuzz. “You, ETS 342, are the miracle I’ve been waiting for.”

“I—what?”

“After 341 dismal failures, you are the first test subject to successfully wield the PWNR and—well, let me just say that your bruises are an immense improvement on the usual outcome. I think the electromagnetic properties of your rusty old shield here are the key I’ve been searching for. To put it bluntly, they saved your life. I’ve never seen anything like it. For how much silver would you be willing to part with it? A gold piece, perhaps? Two? A semi-permanent place on my krewe?”

“Please,” said Ffeldy, backing away on his unsteady feet. “Take it. Keep it. And this war hammer, too. I’ll accept no payment, just promise never to speak to me again.”

Bundling his cash into his new trousers and abandoning the weapons, Ffeldy turned on his heel and ran over to where Atalanta was trying out some new shades of dye on her gauzy clothes.

“Atty,” he said, and held his hands out in front of him.

“Oh, there you are Ffeldy. Tell me what you think. ‘Copper penny’ or ‘papaya?’ Is ‘papaya’ a little too red?”

“You look lovely, Atty. Either way. ‘Papaya’ brings out your eyes. Now bind my hands and let’s get out of here!”


	7. Chapter 7

_Melandru has Feasts, and Lyssa has Masques_

_Packing partiers in all the halls._

_If you want a good time, and it’s me whom you ask,_

_I’ll say, “Go to Balthazar’s Balls!”_

_Have you ever seen one of Balthazar’s Balls?_

_The Queen holds them twice a year._

_Their size and their splendor are marveled by all,_

_Though their fiery heat is severe._

_So come down, experience Balthazar’s Balls,_

_They’re held in Divinity’s Reach._

_They fill up the palace from floors to the walls,_

_You can partake for two silvers each._

_‘Pon ent’ring you’ll see the great god’s Greatsword_

_Raised in a mighty salute._

_A guest to the Balls will never be bored,_

_As they sway to the tune of the lute._

_Temar and Tegon will jump at the Balls,_

_(or dancers in costumes quite striking),_

_But the heat and the sweat produced by it all,_

_You may not find quite to your liking._

_One really must go to the Balls and have fun,_

_If ever one has half a chance,_

_Though gutterminds smirk, giggle, titter and pun,_

_Remember it’s only a dance._

_~ Anonymously composed “barracks ballad” which Captain Logan Thackeray has attempted to ban; Queen Jennah, however, finds it quite droll. Additional verses vary from barracks to barracks, but are mostly too degenerate to reproduce here._

* * *

Ffeldy and Dominick, shackled together again, marched ahead of Atty toward the gates of Divinity’s Reach.

“Dom,” Ffeldy said at last after they had walked in silence for an hour or so. “What kind of mage wields the powers of alchemy and the elements at once? And tosses about magical gibberish that confounds the brain?”

“I think you hit your brainpan five times too many, lad,” said the thief. “Alchemy is the study of chemicals and such. No kind of magic is needed to manipulate them. Just a much bigger brain than you or I possess.”

“Speak for yourself, Dominick,” interjected Atalanta. “But anyway, no self-respecting elementalist dabbles in the mundane arts.” She cast a shower of droplets from her scepter, reflecting a momentary rainbow.

“Showoff,” muttered Dom.

“Intuition and active practice of skills are far more reliable than the act of study. Attunements require one’s entire childhood to develop. If I had wasted my tender years reading books and collecting butterflies, I’d be no more capable of blasting fire at my foes than you are, Ffeldy.”

“I only collected butterflies because we worked in the fields, and it was something interesting to pass the time,” said Ffeldy as his face grew hot. “Didn’t kill them, just remembered how they looked and moved, and drew them later. I made paper models too, but couldn’t get them to fly as accurately as I’d have liked.”

Atalanta cocked her head at him. “Oh, well, I did not realize you hobbied as such, I just used butterflies as an example. If you had started magic early as I did, using a little wind spell perhaps, you could have made any object fly without worry of design.”

“Butterflies make good target practice before knife fights,” added Dominick, and ducked the pebbles Atty sent flying at his head. “And the two of you have got no humoristic sense at all.”

Ffeldy sighed. “Now you’ve run me off the topic of my original question, as usual. Is there a mundane way to meddle with the elements, using no magic? To cast confusionary words of some non-arcane power?”

“Oh lad,” laughed Dominick, “you had me going there for a moment. Confusionary words? Magic-less meddling? You speak of that asura you were talking to back in the cave. Right?”

“Yes.” Ffeldy looked at his feet, pretending to navigate a stretch of bumpy ground, but actually hiding from the embarrassment of his own ignorance. “Was she somehow able to channel chemicals, lightning and fire without any magic at all?”

“Aye,” said Dominick, “and she was no elementalist. She’s in a class of her own, certainly. I can see your interest, though you’d be foolish to seek a living like that. Best that you learn to use a great sword or daggers like a sane person and forget the whole thing.”

“Well,” said Atty. “A small few of that class have fatal enough reputations. I hear they can be decent assistants in a traveling party, and a few of them have risen to great infamy, but when it comes to heroics, the common people want magic and big swords, not them.”

“Milady.” Ffeldy dug in his heels, forcing the others to stop, too. “With due respect, you keep saying ‘they.’ Who are _they_? What are _they_?”

“Engineers,” said Atalanta with another deep, defeated sigh. “They call them engineers.”

###

At last the massive gates of Divinity’s Reach, capital of Kryta, loomed above them in the growing darkness.

“Prepare yourselves, lads,” said Atty as they approached a human-sized door cut into the bottom of the three-story high main gate. “We shall report to Captain Logan Thackeray himself in the main Seraph Headquarters. ‘Tis a great honor for all of us, whether our hands are bound or not. But for the sake of our collective honor, please refrain from mentioning anything about the troll, or the fact that you ran unfettered for any length of time today.”

“What will you pay us?” asked Dominick.

“Would a minor Rune of the Afflicted sway you, thief?”

“Six major Runes of the Afflicted. And engineer runes for Ffeldy here, as he seems half-way smitten by the class in more ways than one. Haha.”

“Done,” said Atty. “All shall be paid up tonight. “But don’t look so lively. Drop your heads, shuffle, like you’ve been to visit Grenth and have returned. Yes, Ffeldy, I like the limp. A nice touch, how clever of you.”

Apparently, she hadn’t noticed that Ffeldy had been limping all day.

The Seraph at the gate, in their gleaming silver armor and winged shields, scowled at the two prisoners as they trudged by, but straightened, saluted, and even smiled in Atalanta’s direction.

“It’s because she’s barely got any clothes on,” whispered Dominick so only Ffeldy could hear. “They say that clothing is a hindrance to the art of magic. The more powerful the sorceress, the more skin she shows.”

“And what about sorcer_ers_? Isn’t that a bit unfair?” asked Ffeldy, but a passing Seraph slapped a glove over his head to silence him.

They ascended a stone ramp wide enough that four dolyak carts could have traveled abreast. Various shops, vendors, and trainers seeking to take on gullible and overconfident apprentices lined the route, and the air smelled of a mélange of molasses, anisette and potato pasties. Both Ffeldy and Dominick’s stomachs growled as Atty led them on without stopping.

From the corner of his eye, Ffeldy thought he saw a familiar diminutive, goggle-eyed asura munching something from a paper cone near a candied almond vendor cart. The hair on his arms rose at the memory of the PWNR. But when he glanced over his shoulder, the asura was gone.

They crossed into an enormous courtyard that, with its vast glass domed roof, was closer to a tropical greenhouse than a garden. The ground turned to spongy green moss beneath Ffeldy’s feet. When he looked up, a massive celestial clock complete with spinning metal planets filled his view. Nearby, a tall, nearly circular arch stood, cordoned off with a rope.

“It looks like the asura gate to Lion’s Arch has been closed,” said Atty as she hurried them past. “The business travelers are going to be very angry. It’s quite the expedition on foot. Ah, but here we are. Behold the palace. The Seraph Headquarters are just ahead through that door.”

The reality of his situation sank in at last as Ffeldy crossed the threshold into the HQ. Here was the nerve center of all police and militia activity in Kryta, and soon he would be initiated into it himself whether he wanted to or not. As he was being frisked up against the wall in the antechamber, he caught a glimpse of a mosaic of parchments pasted to the stone walls. They were notices for wanted criminals and their respective bounties. One prominent poster caught his eye, as it featured the long-eared, wide-eyed visage of a very familiar asura.

_WANTED in Rata Sum for reckless scientific practices, illegal experimentation on sentient creatures, money laundering, possible Inquest ties, misuse of constants of integration, arbitrarily jumping to conclusions about infinity, and various other crimes of physics. Engineer, answers to Fieuzz, College of Dynamics, certified genius. Current whereabouts unknown. Armed and dangerous. Asuran gates in Tyria have been closed until further notice. For Krytan sightings, please contact Seraph headquarters. REWARD: 10 gold._

Ffeldy barely had time to process this information before he, Dominick and Atty were hustled into a lofty chamber large enough to hold Balthazar’s balls—dancers and servants alike. Cloth red and gold banners the size of ship’s sails adorned the walls, though not enough to muffle the deafening echo of many pounding, armored feet.

A long, cluttered desk stretched nearly the full width of the chamber, and at it sat a powerfully-built man with long, dark hair.

“That man there,” said Dominick under his breath, “is Captain Logan Thackeray himself. A regular lion, it’s true, as he does his paperwork in full-plated armor. They say he tackles his in-box with the same gravitas as he would a field of undead. And never gets papercuts, neither.”

“Announcing Lady Atalanta Fiero, the Hero of Shaemoor!” cried the herald at the door.

Atty and her fiery clothes commanded the attention of every Seraph in the room. Ffeldy was glad she seemed to know what to do, because he felt unfit himself for this polished, vaulted room. His brain spun out more unanswered questions. Why should he have an audience with the Captain alongside Atalanta, instead of being quietly shuffled off to the prison, or recruit barracks, or someplace more fittingly vulgar?

Atalanta bobbed a curtsy. After exchanging a grimace with Dominick, Ffeldy and the thief took the hint and bowed as low as was possible without losing balance.

“The Hero of Shaemoor returns!” boomed Logan, rising to his feet. “I have already heard how you vanquished that den of bandits, and a troll besides. And now, here you stand before me with bonus bound-up renegades to boot. Is there nothing that stands in your way, Hero?”

“Well, I—“ began Atty, and Ffeldy heard an uncharacteristic quaver in her voice. “You are much too kind, sir. You gave me a quest, and I pursued it.”

Logan had leaned back over the desk to add a few hasty signatures to the documents in front of him, as if this interruption of his work had not come at a good moment. However, he smiled—a bit thinly, thought Ffeldy—and crooked his finger at one of the many aides-de-camp who moved stacks of parchment and vellum to various shelves about the room. “And I’m sure the Hero would like her reward. Eamon, bring the box.”

“My reward,” said Atty, and this time her face was noticeably dark and flushed, “is pleasing you, Captain.”

“Ah, but surely you saw the bounty out for this pair of troublemakers whom you have managed to capture singlehandedly?”

“I didn’t capture them, merely aided in their transportation…”

Logan held up his hand as the aide stepped forward with a gaudily carved chest. He opened the lid, then stepped aside. “The thief is only worth a few coppers, but you’ll get a silver for the draft dodger, along with the gift of your choice.”

Inside the chest were three pairs of rather utilitarian-looking gloves. Each pair was of slightly different materials and design—one fingerless, one a mere wrist-wrap—and embroidered in purple, green, or gold.

“Would you like the cloth gloves, linen gloves, or velvet gloves?” asked the aide. “Each are equally defensive.”

“Even the wrist guards?” asked Atty, a note of doubt in her voice, and Ffeldy noticed that she glanced down at her own, more elegant, color-coordinated gloves.

The aide wagged an eyebrow. “Especially the wrist guards, milady. They are particularly tough. Though the cloth pair are considered a more powerful design.”

“I’ll take the velvet,” said Atty at last as she reached into the chest. “Thank you, Captain Thackeray. Your generosity knows no bounds.”

The captain, meanwhile, had retreated behind his desk where he was metaphorically ripping through vellum piles with his quill as if they were risen centaurs. He looked up briefly with a mumbled “yes?” at the sound of his name, then settled back into his methodical hack-and-slash administration.

“By the way, milady” said the aide-de-camp as he closed the lid of the chest, “Captain Thackeray thought you might enjoy a brief respite from the dangers of the road.”

“Doesn’t he have a new quest for me?”

“Of course, milady. Instead of risking your lovely cranium in the wilds, you’re to oversee the combat training of these two soon-to-be Seraph.” The aide waved his hand in Ffeldy and Dominick’s direction. “Escort them to the barracks, see they have uniforms and weapon lockers and a bunk apiece, that sort of thing.”

“I…what? The Captain himself said that?”

“Aye, milady. Turn them into bloodthirsty fighters to be feared—or at least adequate meat-shields—and you shall have his undying thanks. Or at least…a leather pouch and harvesting instrument of your choice.”

“Would it trouble Captain Thackeray if I were to…verify his instructions? To be sure there was no miscommunication?”

The aide leaned forward with a conspiratorial twist of his mouth. “Aye, that it would, milady. If you’d prefer another assignment, there are always rats to be killed in Beetletun.”

“I’ll take brigands—I mean recruits—to the barracks,” said Atty firmly.

“Excellent. Seraph DeGlasse will be expecting you, just show him this document and you’ll have no trouble.” The aide pressed into Atty’s hands a folded letter sealed with a bright blob of red wax. Then he turned to one of the guards. “Untie these men. Their term as Seraph recruits has officially begun.”

Ffeldy rubbed feeling back into his wrists, or would have anyway, if he hadn’t been shunted from the room so fast he nearly blacked out from the rotational torque. He and Dominick were jostled out again onto the mossy green plaza, where the round asura gate stood, unlit and roped off.

“Well Atty,” said Dominick wryly, voicing Ffeldy’s own thoughts. “You glad to be stuck with us indefinitely? I wonder how long it will take to turn the pair of us into soldiers…or even fatten us up into less bean-pole and more meat-shieldesque physiques. Hey?”

Atty just rolled her eyes and turned to a weapons dealer, her new gloves in hand. “No, I don’t want to buy a dagger, I just want to sell these gloves. They look elegant enough.”

“I’ll give you ten copper,” said the dealer.

“Is that all? They’re velvet. The raw materials alone must be ten times that. Let me salvage them for you.” She snipped apart the gloves and offered plain strips of cloth to the dealer instead.

“That ain’t no real velvet, milady, just a few scraps of jute. I’ll give you three copper for the rags.”

“Three copper, you rascal? Then I’ll keep my jute and take it to the Black Lion company instead, where buyers pay a worthwhile price.”

“And good luck to you with that, milady.” The dealer gave a sarcastic tip of his hat.

“Come on, you two,” fumed Atty. “Let us find the Seraph Barracks, and this DeGlasse personage. I’ll show Captain Thackeray, and turn the pair of you into the most skilled fighters in all of Tyria. Then he’ll have to give me a worthwhile assignment.”

“Or,” said Dominick with a sly grin, “you could just come out and tell him to his face that he has dreamy eyes and the most gorgeous hair. Instead of just wearing the words on your oh-so-stricken face.”

“Lucky for me, I’m sure the Captain won’t mind if I bump you off first. Now come on, forward march, men.”

“That woman,” whispered Dominick in Ffeldy’s ear as they strode off for the barracks, “could murder Queen Jennah in her sleep if she had a mind to. And who knows, maybe she does.” He winked, but Ffeldy didn’t return it.


	8. Chapter 8

_There is a tough mesmer, DeGlasse,_

_Who runs a cruel Seraphing class,_

_And if you make a jest,_

_Or run off to find rest,_

_There’s a clone of him kicking your ass._

_~ inscribed inside latrine door at the Seraph training academy. Amateur handwriting aficionados suspect that the limerick was likely written by DeGlasse himself, but proof remains inconclusive._

* * *

That night in the Seraph recruit barracks, Ffeldy slept on an actual mattress for the first time in—well, if he was honest with himself, as the youngest child of far too many, he’d never actually had the chance to sleep on one at all. This mattress may have been made of sacking and straw, and the blanket of rough wool and full of thorns, but he slept more deeply than he had since leaving home.

Comfort, as they say, is like a quaggan. Adopt it as your own, and be prepared to lug around eighty pounds of limp, squishy bulk with you if you want to keep it close. Meanwhile, the people who aren’t so amused by its cuteness will constantly take potshots at it, out of spite. Comfort, like a quaggan, is too difficult to carry, too slippery to keep, and makes too many annoying bloobloo noises to be tolerated for long stretches of time.

The complexities of this Krytan idiom would have been lost on Ffeldy to begin with, and though he may have dreamed of nothing but quaggans for those few precious hours, all those googley-eyed fin faces were forgotten when the peaceful night detonated into door-thumping and shouts.

“All right you kittens! Get out of bed and grab your mittens!”

The bay door crashed open and a bright pink aura lit the room. At the center of the pink blaze stood a slight man in a long black coat, open at the front and trimmed with silver fur. He wore a beret over a well-combed slick of fair hair, and at his neck was tied a pink silken cravat.

Ffeldy caught himself just before he rolled off the top of the bunk he shared with Dominick.

“You kittens have three seconds to be off your kittening kittens! Get dressed and fall in line, or you’ll enjoy a nice kitten with the blade of my kittening broadsword. Aiight?”

Ffeldy already wore the fresh linen shirt he’d been issued the night before, and frantically pulled on similarly issued hand-me-down leather breeches and clod-hoppers, the same style worn by the other recruits. The breeches were long enough in the legs, though a bit wide in the waist. The Seraph guards had taken his old clothing out to be burned (except for his prize from the troll hunt--that he’d had to lock away in his assigned trunk), but they’d luckily let him keep his belt.

Besides Ffeldy and Dom, there must have been twenty others, male and female, from all the Krytan towns and other human outposts across Tyria, though Ffeldy hadn’t had the chance to talk with anyone yet. He and Dom had arrived the night before after lights’ out for the other recruits, and had slipped into their respective bunks while the others were snoring away. A handful of the recruits had by now finished dressing and formed two facing lines in the center of the room, at the foot of their respective bunks. Ffeldy and Dominick followed their lead and rushed into place. At least they weren’t the last ones ready.

“Looks like this kitten forgot to tuck in his shirt.”

Ffeldy nearly jumped out of his shoes. This last sentence was whispered in his ear, by someone standing behind him, so close he could feel the breath on his skin. And yet, the diminutive—yet admittedly terrifying—man with the fur-lined coat and beret still lounged by the door in a rather stick-up-the-ass kind of pose, at least fifteen paces away. Ffeldy tilted his head ever so slightly and caught a glimpse of an identical beret-clad, slick-haired man—who then dissolved into a cloud of pink butterflies.

“_Magnifisplendus polyxena_,” mouthed Ffeldy under his breath. He couldn’t help it. That particular genus and species of Lepidoptera had been a rare and exciting sight in the fields near his home. He quickly tucked in the tail of his shirt.

The man in the beret and pink cravat now sashayed to the center of the bay and executed an elegant spin on the heel of one very posh, very shiny boot. A small, very fluffy, very white creature—a pet fox?—bounded along behind him.

“Are we supposed to be scared of him?” whispered Dominick. “Shouldn’t he be waving a little wand with a star on it? The sword hardly matches the outfit.”

Ffeldy forced a slight smile, but his insides were contracting uncomfortably in spite of himself. The girl who stood facing him looked about his age, eighteen or so. Her plain brown hair was twisted into a severe bun—had she slept with it that way? She looked solid enough to be related to Sergeant Belinda Delaqua, yet Ffeldy noticed how a sheen of sweat glistened on her forehead. She seemed scared. She probably knew something he didn’t.

“Would you like to repeat that a little louder, kitten?” said the man in the beret, overhearing Dominick’s rhetorical question. And suddenly, there were three of him. And also, three swords. (Still only one cute white fox, sadly.)

Ffeldy would have liked to abandon Dom to go cower alongside recruit Delaqua across the way, yet some perverse part of him had been raised to stick up for even the most idiotic of companions, and so he pulled his heels together in solidarity. He braced himself. He was not long in becoming collateral damage.

“Well?” Beret #1 swung his sword ever so gracefully over his shoulder.

Dom stood calmly and silently at attention. “Nothing.”

“No please. You were saying?” Beret #2 leaned suavely on his sword as if it was a silver-tipped cane.

“Enlighten us, kitten.” Beret #3 flashed manic grin that made Ffeldy’s blood run cold.

“He didn’t say no-nothing,” stammered Ffeldy, but Dominick jabbed him in the ribs.

“Yes I did,” began Dom loudly, and Ffeldy winced. “I said, are we supposed to be scared of you, sirrah Seraph?”

“Oh, aren’t you?” Beret #1 thrust his sword at the ground. A force wave slammed into the thief, sending him—and Ffeldy, by associated proximity—reeling backwards into a row of wall lockers. Beret #2 twirled his blade menacingly, while Beret #3 gyrated at them like a mad reaper. Ffeldy covered his head with his hands and pressed his face to the cold floor. A poppy of blood blossomed on the stones, oozing from his nose. The force wave had busted a blood vessel, too. When he looked up again, only one of the beret-clad trainers was left, cloaked for a moment in another swathe of pink butterflies.

“By Grenth,” mouthed Ffeldy, waiting for some signal from the trainer that it was safe to get off the floor. “What was that?" 

Dom, who had ended up on his rear, wedged almost completely inside an open locker, dabbed at the blood that dripped from his own nose. He gave a dry laugh. “Based on the butterflies, I’d have to say necromancer.” The tone of his voice implied the word “idiot”.

“Off your kittens!” bellowed the trainer. “Fall in line!” He had a surprisingly resonant voice for such a waifish figure. The other twenty-odd recruits had already gotten themselves into proper-looking rows. Ffeldy bushed the dust from his knees as best he could, then helped extricate Dominick from the locker. Dominick didn’t say thank you, and he didn’t even smile. In fact, he glowered.

“My name,” barked the trainer, “is Pierre le Comte Coocolbeure DeGlasse. Sir Mesmer DeGlasse Sir to you kittens!” He strutted up the rows, casually twirling his sword, and swung it from one shoulder to the other like a very pointy parasol. He snapped his fingers, and the little white fox leapt into the crook of his arm. “This is my familiar, Phantasmal Mr. Fox. And our job is to turn the lot of you kittens into battle-ready Seraph. Some of you will soon be shipped out to forward outposts to protect our good citizens from centaurs. Others will remain in Divinity’s Reach, patrolling the streets and keeping the peace. But no matter where in Tyria you find yourself, one thing is for certain.”

He raised his sword and another clone appeared, spinning like a crazed windmill, and hurtled down the line of recruits who (mostly) dove out of the way or dropped to the floor, Ffeldy included. The flat of the clone’s blade slapped the few recruits who didn’t get out of the way fast enough, and they would have bruises to show for it for days after.

DeGlasse cleared his throat. “You’ll have to learn how to duck and roll.”

* * *

Ffeldy spent most of the morning being shouted at by various incarnations of DeGlasse. The trainer and about half a dozen of his clones shouted the recruits into formation, then shouted them down the stairs and into the courtyard, where they were then shouted through an hour of physical training. Breakfast involved much more shouting than gruel, of which Ffeldy managed to swallow a spoonful or two before they were shouted up from the table, and out the door to the yard for even more exercises and shouting. At least he hadn’t eaten enough to vomit.

He managed to make eye contact a few times with the severe-looking young woman, whom he still thought of as Recruit Delaqua, though he hadn’t managed to exchange words with anyone since the Force Wave Incident that morning. Once after a round of leap-the-moon drills he raised his eyebrow, trying to communicate a message along the lines of, “well, this Seraphing business is as fun as a barrel full of quaggans, no?” and thought he saw a sliver of a smile flash across her sweat-streaked face.

They did hylek jumps, skale crawls, norn carries, skritt dashes and a team race DeGlasse called “haul the drunks around the battlements and slop them in the moat,” while Phantasmal the fox nipped the heels of anyone who lagged. By noon every recruit was dripping wet and smelled like pond scum.

“Well, my bedraggled kittens,” said DeGlasse to the sodden ranks of swaying recruits. “Some of yah may have heard of something called class. Which clearly none of you have. Aiight?”

By this time the recruits had learned well enough that any smart talk to the mesmer earned an unpleasant force wave and a bloody nose. “No, sir, mesmer DeGlasse, SIR!” they chorused.

“You don’t just wake up one day and say, I think I’ll be a ranger, or ele, or a guardian. And for sure not a mesmer. You must have something called aptitude. Aiight?”

“Yes, sir, mesmer DeGlasse, SIR!”

“And just how do I know that you kittens have aptitude? Any guesses? Don’t I get a sly remark from Mr. Dominick Garret? You’re too kittenshit now, eh?”

Nervous silence from the recruits.

“Then I’ll tell you. I’ll test you for aptitude, and assign you a class whether you like it or not. Once you have your class, you’re stuck with it. Aiight?”

“Yes, sir, mesmer DeGlasse, SIR!”

The mesmer stroked the white fox, which had nestled in his arms. “I shall be assisted today with your class assignments by the Hero of Shaemoor, Ms. Atalanta Fiero, who has graciously deigned to give her time and expertise to you lot of kittens, which is more than any of you deserve.”

Ffeldy heard a collective gasp from the other recruits. They were also familiar with the Hero of Shaemoor song—and, like him, had at some point probably drunkenly belted it out while doing a hornpipe on a table in some dingy village pub. Now they all craned their necks to view the woman who emerged onto the training yard, wearing the familiar dress of flame.

“Eyes front!” barked DeGlasse, and they all snapped their heads forward again. “Listen up, kittens. I won’t have none of you staring’. Now I want you to count off by twos, starting with Mr. Dominick over here. Ones come with me, twos with Ms. Fiero over yonder, and she’s Ma’am, Hero of Shaemoor, MA’AM to you!”

Dom shouted out “one!” and broke formation to stand where DeGlasse had motioned. Ffeldy, who stood next to him, yelled “two!” and jogged over to Atty. The training-atmosphere prevented him from greeting her with a smile or, gods forbid, a casual remark, and he waited for her to break the ice.

“Greetings, recruit,” she said blandly, as if she’d never seen him before. She wore an overly officious expression as she handed him a small square of parchment printed with runes:

Seraph Recruit Classes

  1. Heavy Armor– Guardian, Warrior
  1. Light Armor – Mesmer, Elementalist, Necromancer
  1. Medium Armor – Thief, Ranger, F-------

The printing job had been a bad one, and the last word was both smudged by excess ink and cut off at the bottom of the page.

The other recruits selected to group two lined up next to him. Atty handed them similar parchments in the same aloof manner. The recruits waited patiently, nervously, and Ffeldy noticed, with a pang of relief, that the Recruit Delaqua had made it into his group. Atty strolled up the line like a cobbler inspecting the dismal stack of pig hides she was expected to turn into royal slingback heels fit for Queen Jennah. On the far end of the line she turned and whipped her scepter in an arc. Shards of stone pelted the recruits, many of whom, like Ffeldy, ducked or yelled iterations of “ow!” Only a few stood firm. Recruit Delaqua withstood the barrage, despite trickles of blood on her forehead and lip.

Atty pulled out a stick of charcoal.

“Hold out your parchments,” she said. “This is for the preliminary cut.” As she made her way back down the line, she drew quick black marks on most of them. When she handed Ffeldy’s parchment back to him, he saw that she’d drawn thick lines through Warrior and Guardian. Not unexpected, but he felt a twinge of disappointment.

“Wait, Von Ffeldy. May I see your parchment?”

He handed it back, hoping against hope she’d made a mistake, but instead of removing any of the marks she merely added a new one. A line through Elementalist.

“I thought I’d save you the time and trouble."

Ffeldy hadn’t expected her to be that nice to him. But he hadn’t expected her to be so cold.

Atalanta next led the Group Two recruits back to the mess hall, though instead of getting to eat as they had all hoped, she sat them down at the tables and distributed a written exam. The recruits who couldn’t read or write signed their marks at the top of the pages and slumped glumly with their heads on the table for the next hour or so. For once Ffeldy glowed with an unfamiliar feeling of superiority, but that soon faded as he faced question after question of unanswerable arcaneness.

\- What is the ideal level of spite for a minion necromancer?

\- What ingredients are required to make omnomberry bars?

\- What are the strengths and weaknesses of fernhound pets?

\- What is the maximum range of a shortbow?

\- How much mithril ore is required for an earring hook?

\- When and where will the Claw of Jormag next appear?

\- What champion descends regularly on the SouthSun Cove?

Ffeldy managed to answer a few basic cooking questions – what did any of this have to do with class assignments? – and ashamedly rattled off detailed answers to some very esoteric questions about math. (Complete with equations. For a moment he wanted to shoot himself in the foot for the enthusiasm with which he wrote.) And though the remaining time might have been better spent napping on the table with his fellow recruits, he spent the rest of the hour jotting snarky answers to some of the more impossible questions.

\- What is the most effective way to neutralize a horde of 4+ centaurs? _A very large explosion_

\- You are down to 5% health. What do you do? _Run away_

\- What is the first thing you do when outnumbered? _Yell “help”_

\- Who most inspires you? _An asura wanted by all of Tyria for felony_

What were they going to do, press-gang him into the Seraph?

Someone bumped his elbow. Ffeldy looked up. The recruit next to him furtively slid him a note on a tiny scrap of parchment. Recruit Delaqua. Ffeldy unfolded the note under the table, pretending to still be engrossed with the exam.

_What class are you hoping for? – Kai_

Ffeldy wrote NONE and on second thought added:

_Why no armorsmithing? Or cook? No warrior here. You? – Ffeldy_

He folded it up and slid it back in her direction. Soon she tapped him again with the note.

GUARDIAN she’d written in large block letters, underlined twice. He glanced at her hard, determined face, her hair pulled back so tight it seemed to pull her cheeks into those lethal, bony points. But when he winked, she winked back.

_You look the part. Best of luck_.

When Kai read his response, she broke for the first time into a broad, though very red-faced, grin.

“Time’s up!” hollered the Hero of Shaemoor, and the recruits passed their papers in.

* * *

The rest of the afternoon consisted of more tests. First to a small paddock containing a bear, into which the recruits went, one by one, while Atalanta observed the interactions. A few recruits seemed to get on well, and one young man from Ebonhawke appeared to talk to it in an odd language made up of huffing and shoulder-thrusting. Soon the Ebonhawke lad and the bear were scratching one another’s backs and chuckling bear-like at what must have been bear jokes. Other recruits held their ground, if not their tempers. Would-be guardian Kai tolerated the bear as it circled her, snuffling at her boots. When it pawed her behind, however, she slammed her elbow onto its head.

“Next!” said Atalanta sharply while the poor bear whimpered in the far corner.

Ffeldy knew this must be the ranger test. Maybe this was something he could excel at. He’d grown up on a farm. He knew animals well enough. He could slaughter a chicken as well as the next farmboy, could repair a dolyak harness and pluck pinfeathers off a moa to fletch arrows without being bitten. Was this his calling?

The answer, it turned out, was a resounding NO. The bear, perhaps jaded by his interactions with a dozen other nervous recruits, grew aggressive as soon as Ffeldy slid open the paddock gate. Thirty seconds after that, the bear had pinned Ffeldy to the ground, sat on his chest, and tried to eat his face. Five seconds after THAT, Ffeldy found himself leaning against the outside of the paddock gate, and indebted to the Hero of Shaemoor once again. And a big black mark through the word “ranger” on his parchment.

Then there was a thief test involving dodging, sprinting, stealthily approaching and pick-pocketing a Seraph dressed as a wealthy target. Had Ffeldy been a real thief, and this a real encounter, he would have ended up at the pointy end of some Seraph’s sword, then the stocks, he was sure of it. Dominick, wherever he was in Group One, must have shined here. Ffeldy received a line through “thief” as expected.

Most humiliating of all, as it turned out, was the necromancer test.


	9. Chapter 9

_Well rangers they range,_

_And guardians guard, _

_And mesmers are quite mesmerizin’,_

_The thieves—they all thieve,_

_And warriors war,_

_And necros, they keep the dead risin’._

_If you were to ask what elementalists do,_

_I’d say that it’s quite elemental;_

_Now I’ve named all the classes—_

_Oh, wait, there’s one more?_

_The class nearly left on the cutting room floor:_

_Eas’ly ID’d by large drops of supply_

_And a camera lucida strapped to one eye;_

_Often seen hefting a mud-colored sack_

_That has toilet-plunger things hanging down off the back._

_If that don’t sound romantic, I’ll tell you what’s worse,_

_For this is the point of my doggerel verse:_

_Without engineers, your house will fall down,_

_Your axles won’t turn and your marshlands will drown._

_Sewers? What’s that? Toss the slop on the street,_

_Since those underground tunnels remain incomplete._

_Town walls will collapse in a tumble of blocks,_

_And the gates will crash in when the en’my but knocks._

_~ excerpt from a protest song written by anonymous members of the Network of Engineers Resistant to (non-engineer-related) Favoritism [NERF]._

* * *

“Enter!”

Ffeldy hesitated outside DeGlasse’s study door. The Seraph escort, however, was not a quivering jelly of nerves and opened the door for him. The Seraph even gave Ffeldy a hearty shove inside for good measure.

“Ah, there he is,” said the mesmer silkily as Ffeldy stumbled in, willing his knees to hold for just a few minutes more. DeGlasse was reclined with his feet on his desk, but slid his boots to the floor as the Seraph guard backed from the room and closed the door. “I see you’ve been revived after your, err, Necromantic Incident.”

Ffeldy pressed a hand to the wall to steady himself. The room seemed to rock like wave-tossed ship, though more calmly now than a short time earlier. At least this room was fairly bright. The shadows present swayed unnaturally, but didn’t lunge at him. Not anymore.

“What’s that you’re mumbling, kitten? You alright?”

“Uh…yes, sir. I’ll live.” Ffeldy stood up straight and gingerly pulled his hand away from the wall. “Just a touch wobbly, still.”

“The medic on scene said he’d never seen such a vitriolic case of fear-chaining in all his years of practice. And he’s had a lot of practice.”

Ffeldy nodded. “He suspects I must have developed a strain of necrallergy, sir. Said I was to be banned from handling any more cursed amulets. It’s in my medical records now, sir.

“How very wise. I’m glad to hear you’ve pulled your neck through yet another scrape.”

“Thank you, that’s kind of you, sir.” Ffeldy couldn’t help rubbing his neck. He tried not to stare too hard at DeGlasse’s greatsword which hung from two pegs on the wall. “They say a bad copper coin keeps showing back up. I guess they was referring to yours truly.”

DeGlasse wandered to the front of his desk and seated himself with a suave flick of his head. “Perhaps they were. But that isn’t why I wanted to speak with you.”

“And the damage to the necro-lab will be deducted from my pay, sir. Last I heard, the escaped bone minions was rounded up, all but for the one that got stuck in the chimney flu—“

“I don’t wish to talk to you about no kitten minions either.”

“Sir?”

“I want to talk to you about _this_.” DeGlasse help up a sheaf of papers. “Your file. More specifically, your class selection.” He placed the parchment with the charcoal lines on the desk next to where he sat, and beckoned Ffeldy over to take a look. “You’ll notice that every class is crossed off this list. Except mesmer. And I don’t expect that to hold for long.”

“Mesmer DeGlasse, sir…” Ffeldy laughed, tried to, but it came out sounding like he’d gotten a fishbone wedged in his trachea. “There’s still that ‘F’ at the bottom there. It obviously stands for ‘Engineer’ but the word was smudged and the bottom of the ‘E’ cut off. And I have a feeling that’s likely where I’m supposed to go.”

DeGlasse rose slowly from the table. “My dear, dear kitten. We don’t train engineers in the Seraph. We are too…sexy for that. And besides, that funding was cut years ago. Our engineering’ needs are contracted out to Maguuman and Ascalonian conglomerates, mostly. The ‘F’ you see stands for ‘Fail’. And that, I fear, is what your about to get.”

“But…” A sudden wind gust through the window sent a chill up Ffeldy’s spine. “I was sentenced to a life of Seraphing.”

DeGlasse riffled through Ffeldy’s file. “It says here, ‘A life of Seraphing in lieu of death on the gibbet.’ So that means—“

“If—when I fail, I’ll be executed after all,” Ffeldy finished for him. His knees started to buckle again, as if a little asura had just jabbed him with another tranquilizer.

Before he dropped, Ffeldy felt pressure on his arm. DeGlasse had caught him and now steered him deftly to a chair, into which Ffeldy dropped despondently.

“Look at me kitt—young man,” growled the mesmer, holding Ffeldy in his firm gaze. “You still have a chance to be a mesmer. But you must give it every ounce of your concentration and will. Aye?”

Feldy choked out a sound and nodded. His eyes were wide, he was visualizing the hangman fitting the rope on his neck.

“Your written exam was one of the better—well, more creative ones we’ve seen. So you aren’t stupid. Just daft.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Aiight. Now, I want you to sit there an’ clear your mind. Think of empty white snow. Well, have you got it?”

Ffeldy exhaled and thought of snow. (Old, empty, deathlike snow, the kind the skeletal hands of Grenth would bring…)

“I want you to concentrate on snow, concentrate, nothing but white and empty snow…more…yes…now, split!”

“What?”

“Split!” shouted DeGlasse in Ffeldy’s ear. “Split yourself into two!”

Ffeldy sat, his knuckles white from gripping the chair. He stared at DeGlasse in utter incomprehension.

“You can do it, you kitten! Clone yourself, now!”

“I…but I don’t even know what muscle to flex!” cried Ffeldy at last. So that was it, then. He had failed.

DeGlasse laid on him a long, bitter look. “Well, I tried.” He probably would have said more, but a vigorous knocking on the door interrupted him.

“Just a kittening moment!” barked DeGlasse. Not loudly enough, apparently, because the door burst open anyway.

There stood a flush-faced Kai, breathing hard as if she’d run up a dozen flights of stairs—which she probably had. She thumped her chest in salute, and didn’t notice Ffeldy slumped in his chair in the corner.

DeGlasse’s face, which had gone slack with his disappointment in Ffeldy, now tightened in rage. He shot Kai a glare. He coiled a thick strand of his own hair around his fingers, as if to distract his hand from lunging for his sword and blasting Kai from his office on a force wave.

“I assume this is an emergency?” said the mesmer in a voice so dry, he could have cured a live trout into jerky.

“Yes, Mesmer DeGlasse, sir!” huffed Kai between breaths.

“The building is on fire?”

“No, sir.”

“Centaurs have broken down the gates and are storming the city?”

“Not as of the present time, sir.”

“Then I can only assume that Jormag has returned.”

“Not as such, sir.”

“Well then, it ain’t no emergency, is it? Go stand in the hall until you’re called like a good, docile little trainee.”

Ffeldy knew that had he—or anyone else, for that matter—been in Kai’s place, he would have been cowed and done as he was told. But Kai still stood, fist on heart, and while her face looked stricken, she spoke in a calm, clear voice.

“Mesmer DeGlasse, sir, I refuse to leave until I’ve said my piece. It has come to my attention that I’m not to be made a guardian at the ceremony tomorrow.”

“What drivel is this? Out!” Now DeGlasse did reach for his sword, but as he swung it from the rack, his eyes fell on Ffeldy and he hesitated.

Kai took the mesmer’s hesitation as a sign that she should press on. “Sir, I’ve wanted to be a guardian more than anything in the world. I’ve worked hard at it for as long I can remember. And now I understand I’m to be made a…a…”

“First take a deep breath, then unknot your drawers,” said DeGlasse without a trace of pity in his voice. He made a show of seating himself on his desk, crossing his legs, and laying the sword next to him within easy reach. “Most kittens don’t get what they want. I made that clear from the first. Ask Ffeldy here what he’s to get. If the pair of you want to trade, that’s fine by me.”

Kai turned toward where the mesmer gestured. “Ffeldy…oh.” Her face flushed again, this time from embarrassment. “I haven’t seen you since the necro test. There was a rumor that you’d…well, I knew you hadn’t actually died or anything but…they didn’t give you guardian, did they?”

“Uh, well I…”

“Because I know I didn’t fail guardian,” she continued without letting Ffeldy get a word in. “I didn’t fail anything, not a single class. The only ‘x’ I got was through the F at the bottom of my card!”

DeGlasse crossed and uncrossed his arms. “Did I not make it clear that you do not _pick_ your class, your class is _assigned_ to you?”

“But sir! Just look at me. I can’t possibly be a…a…”

“A mesmer?” DeGlasse finished for her. “And why not, kitten? Choose your words carefully, as I can be a bit sensitive on the subject.”

“First of all, sir, I’m tall. I’m very strong. I’m—“

“Part norn, aren’t you?” cut in DeGlasse. “Father’s side, I believe?”

That explained a lot, thought Ffeldy.

“If you compare me to, say, the Hero of Shaemoor, or to yourself, begging your pardon, sir, I’m not exactly typical mage material. On the playground they used to call me Head Crusher.” In an undertone she added, “I’m sorry you have to hear all this, Ffeldy.”

“But you excel at the arcane, miss Head Crusher,” said DeGlasse. “And that’s more than Ffeldy here can say for himself.”

“So do guardians—they combine protective magic and strength! With all due respect, sir, how is this not obvious to you?

“And with the little respect due to you, Miss Karkasonne, are you implying that I and the Hero of Shaemoor are both dainty _and_ stupid?”

“If I were a coward, sir, the answer to that question would be an easy one. But since I have courage, gods help me, then yes. You must be stupid, sir.” Despite her now-pale face and the nervous sweat on her brow, her voice didn’t waver. Ffeldy was beyond impressed. “Just because my dear, dainty mother was both aristocrat and mesmer doesn’t mean…”

Ffeldy blinked. Suddenly two Kais stood where before there had been one.

“And there she’s gone and doubled herself in her anger.” DeGlasse flashed his wide, victorious grin. “Classic mesmer. See, Ffeldy? That,” he sounded almost proud, “is how it is done.”

The appearance of her clone dampened the fire of Kai’s rage. She glared sullenly at the image of herself, and in a fit of self-consciousness patted down some flyaway strands of her tight red braid. Her cloned image did the same, as if she were a reflection and not a separate entity. Then Kai—again mirrored by her clone—wiped a palm across her freckled cheek.

DeGlasse nodded at this signal of defeat, not without a grin. “I see you haven’t yet learned to control your instincts, miss Karkasonne. All that guardian training getting in the way, and whatnot. If only poor kitten Ffeldy here had that problem. His complaint is nearly as grievous as yours, lass.”

Kai’s double flickered out like a wind-snuffed candle, and Kai herself regained her composure. “Are they going to make you a necro, Ffeldy? Even though you’re allergic?”

“Oh, well,” laughed Ffeldy, forcing lightness into his internal black void, “I suppose it isn’t quite as bad as that. At the ceremony-banquet tomorrow the Seraph—or Captain Thackeray, or whoever presents us our classes—is going to fit a ceremonial noose around my neck, announce that I’ve failed training completely, and my heels will be swinging from the rafters around the time they hand out the desserts.”

Kai gasped—an awfully kind gesture on her part, thought Ffeldy, touched.

“Point of fact,” interjected DeGlasse. “They prefer to wait until after dessert for the sake of those with delicate-like constitutions. And they use the gibbet outside, never the rafters. But aside from that, what the kitten says is accurate enough.”

Kai remained speechless.

“So if you still would like to argue against your mesmer assignment, young lass, I’m sure we can arrange something’ similar for yourself. And then you can still prove to Queen and country how courageous you are. Aye?”

A knock on the door gave Kai a brief respite from answering.

DeGlasse bashed his fists on the table, barely missing his sword. “Unless Jormag himself is in the palace and this very second is eating the Queen, you will not open that door!”

The door opened anyway. There stood a very armored, very shiny, and very unexpected Captain Logan Thackeray.

“Oh Glassy,” said the captain with much good humor. “Bark still worse than your bite, eh? You and your identical cronies scaring the bloomers off the recruits and all that? I hope you never change, my friend.”

DeGlasse, meanwhile, scrambled off the desk and thumped his fist to his chest. His elbow caught on the blade of his sword, sweeping the weapon to the floor with a clatter. DeGlasse started to stoop for it, then appeared to reconsider how unseemly this would appear to the great captain.

“Ffeldy,” hissed DeGlasse. “Pick up that sword. And quick!”

“Oh look,” exclaimed Thackeray with a bellicose laugh, “the recruits are here already! And being chewed to shreds, no doubt. Are you excited to find out your classes at the big ceremonial banquet tomorrow, young lady and young man?”

Feldy recovered DeGlasse’s sword and bowed awkwardly to the captain. “I’m sure I won’t get any sleep tonight, sir.”

Thackeray crinkled his brows. “I know you, lad. You’re the draft-dodger the Hero of Shaemoor brought in last week. Have she and Glassy given you a good drubbing these past few days?”

“Oh yes, sir.”

Thackeray gripped Ffeldy’s hand. “Ah…from the gallows to the ranks. I do love a success story, what? Look forward to shaking your hand again at the ceremony. I know Glassy here isn’t big on hopes, dreams and all that, but I do hope you get your first choice.” Thackeray winked and nearly shook Ffeldy’s arm out of its socket. “Ah, and here is Miss Karkasonne! I saw your mother at Countess Anise’s brunch this morning. She sends her regards—said to pass along something about you wearing more pink, lace and all that. No idea what she meant by it, but she assured me you’d know. Oh, but you do look lovely with your hair all knotted up like that, dear.”

By this time DeGlasse had recovered from his shock somewhat and sheathed his sword. He cleared his throat in a way that, to Ffeldy, seemed uncharacteristically meek. “Captain Thackeray, sir, to what do we owe this great honor? You haven’t come just to chat with the recruits, I take it?”

“Oh, right, right,” chuckled the captain, and swept his hand through glossy hair that gave DeGlasse’s own lustrous coif a run for its money. “Now this is on the down-low, so you recruits had better keep this close to your chests.” He lowered his voice. “We’re going to have a special distinguished visitor at the ceremony tomorrow, one Assistant to the Assistant of some Arcane Councilor from Rata Sum. Her business is with a local guild, but she expressed interest in sampling the local culture. Apparently, she’s some old friend of the queen, so I offered to entertain her for the evening. And this state banquet is as good as any other, I suppose, so I’ll be bringing her along—well, really it’s because Lieutenant Groban forgot to remind me that my presence is required here tomorrow. I told him off, but my hands are tied.”

“And, umm, what precisely, Captain Thackeray, would you like from me?” asked DeGlasse in his disturbingly meek voice.

“I’m sorry to put this on you, Glassy, but someone’s got to oversee the opening and closing of the Asura Gate tomorrow. What with the bounty on that Inquest engineer, gate closures and all that, everything’s so much more complicated than it should be.” A brief cloud passed across his face and he muttered “It always is, with asura."

“I’ll see to it, Captain,” replied DeGlasse. “Who knows, maybe we’ll end up playing host to some little mad scientist blowhard by accident. I sure as Grenth can’t tell one asura from another—they’re all teeth and ears to me.”

“I knew I could count on you, Glassy.” Thackeray turned toward Ffeldy and Kai, who had taken up awkward positions against the wall. “Oh, he thinks he’s all prickly, Glassy does, but he’s a good egg all around. Don’t be deceived.” The captain beamed. “He’s also the second-sexiest mesmer in all of Tyria. Oh, you hate it when I say that, don’t you Glassy? Recruits, I look forward to cheering you on to your new Seraphing careers. Until tomorrow, then! May the Six speed you on your way.” And then he was gone.

Kai and Ffeldy exchanged glances. DeGlasse still stood before his desk, shoulders now drooped, and even his immaculate white-blonde hair had fallen out of place. “Well,” he said at last, and sighed. “I may as well get that Asuran Gate opening sorted. Lots of red tape to unravel there, to be sure. Ffeldy, you’re appointed to kitchen duties from now until the ceremony starts, to keep your hands busy. Miss Karkasonne will escort you there.” He sighed. “Know that I’m truly sorry it’s to be this way. Just try not to make a scene tomorrow, Ffeldy, aiight?”

“I’ll try, sir.”

They exited DeGlasse’s office, and Ffeldy let out a sigh—not exactly of relief—as the door closed behind them.

“How very tragic,” said Kai in a wistful voice as they descended the stairs.

“It’s very kind of you to say so,” said Ffeldy. “Really. And, umm, I’m glad you’re here.”

“My mother’s family treads a lot of the noble circles, so I tend to hear stories. I had heard that DeGlasse and Thackeray were fast friends a long time ago, back when they first entered into the Seraph, though maybe it wasn’t called the Seraph then. Thackeray’s star was on the rise from the first and, well, you can see what DeGlasse is stuck doing nowadays. He was born in the gutter, worked hard to make a name for himself, while Thackery had an easy time of it, being descended from heroes. I wonder if DeGlasse isn’t bitter about more than that. I’ve always suspected a little of the unrequited L-word, that sort of thing. That’s what makes it even more tragic.”

“Oh,” said Ffeldy, and scowled. “That sounds relatively untragic to me.”

“Ffeldy, I’m so sorry!” exclaimed Kai. She stopped in her tracks and turned to face him. “To think I keep going on about gossipy nonsense while you’ve…”

“Got my head in a noose? I mean, if your intent is to divert my rather…morbid thoughts, I thank you for the effort but it’s not really working.”

“We’ll come up with a plan. I’ll help you escape, smuggle you to the Shiverpeaks, to my father’s house. Maybe he’ll be drunk enough to confuse you for me, at least for a couple of days.”

“That sounds like a terrible idea.” Ffeldy motioned her down the next flight of stairs, but she held his arm and pulled him into an alcove, out of sight of the guards posted on either end of the hallway.

“It was my first idea, Ffeldy. I’m just brainstorming here.”

“First, all the Gates are locked down. You heard the captain. Second, my last escape went terribly. If the Fort Salma lieutenant catches me again, he’ll chop my head off first, then ask me questions later. Third, I have no practical skills to survive anywhere outside of a Krytan farm. At least here, I was hoping to learn something useful. Instead of running away, I need to make DeGlasse to realize that I could be a decent Seraph, or at least that stringing me up is more trouble than it’s worth.”

“And how would you do that?”

“I guess we still have until sundown tomorrow to think of something, Kai.”

“Chin up, Ffeldy.” To his surprise, Kai threw her arms around him and crushed him to her chest. She still wore her battered practice armor, and Ffeldy swore he heard his bones crack against the bronze cuirass as she pushed his back against the wall. Then she kissed him, as violently as he might have expected. She was a good head taller than him—and many times stronger—and when he felt his toes leave the ground, he wasn’t sure if it was a metaphor for sudden passion or if she had literally hoisted him in the air.

“Head Crusher, eh?” he managed at last when she released him. “Makes sense.”

“There’s no need to thank me,” said Kai in a voice that implied that yes, actually, there was. “I merely sensed a certain…desperation about you. The thought of a young man facing the gallows, having never been properly kissed. It’s the least I could do. However,” she added in a low voice, “please don’t spread this around. I don’t really have feelings for…Krytan boys. Nothing personal. Just the way I am.”

“Oh, well, I’m touched by your sense of the charitably romantic,” said Ffeldy, and was about to ask if he really seemed that desperate, when one of the Seraph guards loudly cleared his throat nearby.

“Well now, it’s a good thing there isn’t any snogging in dark corners going on, because I’m sure Mesmer DeGlasse would love to, eh, get himself involved, what?” called out the guard in a faux-cheerful voice. Kai and Ffeldy bolted for the stairwell.

They found the kitchen in the lowest level of the main building. It was enormous, a vast underground cavern chipped out of the rock—not quite as spacious as the troll cave, perhaps, though it did bear a certain resemblance. It was also louder, steamier and smelled somewhat better.

“I’d best be getting back,” said Kai. “But I’ll find you at supper. Maybe we’ll have a better plan then. Keep your chin up, and your fingers away from any cheese graters.”

One of the assistant chefs supplied Ffeldy with an apron, a linen toque to protect his hair from the soup—or maybe it was the other way around—a half-dozen sealed wooden crates stamped with the words “carrots” and “potatoes”, and a very dull vegetable peeler. A kitchen dogsbody, obviously thrilled to advance in the pecking order now that Ffeldy had arrived, prised open one of the crates.

“My name’s Barrow, an’ that’s Mister Barrow to you. Here’s yer bowl for peelings, and yer pot for the clean veg. Don’t leave no streaks of dirt, or Chef Raspy will get growly. I’ll be over there, supervising.” With that, Barrow reached into a bag labeled “Dried Ascalonian Seasoning”, drew out a pinch of herbs that he rolled up in a bit of parchment, and lit the end of the paper in a nearby hearth. As Barrow ducked out of view, Ffeldy guessed that this kid, younger even than himself, didn’t often get to foist his responsibilities onto others.

The work, while fast-paced, wasn’t exactly difficult, and Ffeldy found he could let his mind drift back to his immediate situation. As he tossed smooth, bright orange carrots into the pot, he tried to work through to problem at hand without getting mentally hung up, as it were, on his future hanging. DeGlasse, while grumpy and bitter, didn’t hate him. No one wanted to see him strung up, as far as he knew, but the law said it was to be, and that was that. Did that _have_ to be that?

“I’m supposed to be an engineer,” he muttered to himself, and wadded up a pile of stringy orange peels. “But I can’t be if the Seraph won’t train them. If only I could convince them to change that one stupid policy. But then who would teach me?”

“Oh, I’ll learn ya!”

Ffeldy glanced up. Barrow lolled in the corner with his Ascalonian cigarette between his teeth and an unnaturally drooping grin on his face.

“Everything ya needs to know. Engines, ears, the holy Ing, I can learn ya engineering…” Barrow’s voice began to slur and drift off until he slumped back, the cigarette collapsing into ash over his shirt, and he began to snore.

Ffeldy had finished the crate of carrots. Instead of waking Barrow, he gently prised the crowbar from Barrow’s hands and loosened the lid of the next crate himself. The lid hadn’t been well-fastened and popped off with barely a tap of his bar. Ffeldy peered inside, and almost screamed. A small head—belonging to an asura, with goggles fastened about the eyes, lay among the potatoes. And when the head moved, he had to clamp his hands to his mouth to avoid drawing the attention of the entire kitchen.

“Salutations, Test Subject 342! I know I purchased that shield of yours at the price of never conversing with you again, but, as they say in Ascalon: _extremis malis extrema remedia_. Now hoist me out of here. These tubers are most uncomfortable.”


	10. Chapter 10

_Luck is a Quaggan:_

_Clap hands and shout loud enough—_

_She may look at you._

_Misfortune a Krait:_

_Though you choose to ignore him,_

_He lurks, poised to strike._

_~ Syllabic verses attributed to the Canthan poet Gorani_

* * *

“Fieuzz?” Ffeldy, after some jostling, managed to wrest her from the potato crate. Chef’s assistant Barrow still snored away in the corner, and Ffeldy did his best to block his view. He lowered his voice. “I would have said I was glad to see a friendly face—uh, you are friendly?—if our meeting up like this didn’t make everything even more complicated. See, you’ve got a Seraph bounty on your head for ten gold—“

“Only ten?” said Fieuzz loudly. “For shame.”

“Please keep your voice down. Also, there’s a literal sword hanging on a string over _my_ head, and I wouldn’t want it to strike you, too.”

Fieuzz looked up at the ceiling. “No there isn’t.”

“Sorry. Make that a _metaphorical_ sword.” He glanced nervously behind him, picked up a potato, and sliced off the peel in a few practiced strokes.

“Be careful how you use those terms, ETS 342. They are not interchangeable, you know. Lives have been lost due to such imprecise diction.”

“I know, I mean—that’s not the point. But you can’t stay here. Either get away while you can, or hide somewhere until I get off shift.”

“Nonsense, 342. The human lawkeepers may have been more intelligent than expected in our merry chase, and they may have gotten their large, ungainly hands on most of my gear—the PWNR, your shield, my incapacitated golem Mr. Pickwick—but I’ve pulled one over on them this time. Instead of fleeing, I have infiltrated their own central nervous system: the Seraph Training Academy itself. As far as they know, I’m stranded and as good as unarmed!” Fieuzz paused and coughed. She looked cold, her lips tinged blue. “Which would be an outstanding deduction on the Seraph’s part. Because I am.”

Ffeldy pulled up a corner of the oilcloth covering a nearby table and slid Fieuzz underneath where she might be better hidden from view, and perhaps warmer as well. “Don’t move. I’ll be right back.”

Ffeldy found a clean bowl and sauntered as casually as possible to the big bubbling pot of vegetable soup-in-progress. After ladling some of the broth into the bowl, he ducked down under the table near his vegetable peeling station and handed Fieuzz the bowl. The little asura cupped her hands around the warm bowl and breathed in the steam. She still bore her fierce, cheerful smile, but Ffeldy thought he saw the corner of her mouth twitch, as if she were suppressing some deeper, darker thought.

“You said my bounty was only ten gold?” she asked. Ffeldy nodded and resumed his peeling. “Really? My brain alone is worth eighty-seven at least. Not that I expect humans to place much value there.”

“I’m right here, you know,” grumbled Ffeldy. “I’m not a tree, last time I checked. And I know what it’s like to have a bounty on one’s head. Though yours was about a thousand percent higher than mine, if it makes you feel better. You’re not the only one up to the ears in trouble here.”

“That does not signify,” said Fieuzz as she sipped the soup. “Trouble is disproportionate to intellectual capacity. My brain is capable of sparing me from all but the most complex dangers. The more mundane, every-day problems like yours are easily navigated by an intellect such as mine. Therefore, trouble that trips _me_ up is exponentially worse than what you face.”

“I’m being hanged tomorrow night,” said Ffeldy, and found that he’d gotten so numb to the idea that saying it out loud didn’t bother him anymore. “I don’t think your own fate is quite as…imminent?”

“What, hanged?” scoffed the little engineer. “Please. If you rubbed two brain cells together, you could solve your problem in seconds.”

“Oh really? Be my guest.” Ffeldy explained to her the past few days of testing, the meeting in DeGlasse’s office, his talk with Kai (omitting the kiss, of course) and his kitchen sentence until the ceremony. He concluded with his own thoughts, or as far as he had gotten with them: how he didn’t want to escape, just convince the powers-that-be not to get rid of him with so much…finality.

“That’s a…reasonable start for a beginner such as yourself in the art of brain use,” admitted Fieuzz as she slurped up the last of the carrots from the bottom of her bowl. “But you have failed to acknowledge a critical development.”

“An’ what’s that?”

She shook her head cynically at him. “Me.”

“Who’s that you’re talking to, boy?” Barrow had woken. He hoisted himself from the corner and strutted over to loom down at Ffeldy, flicking ash from a newly-rolled Ascalonian cigarette. “We get a batch of talkative tubers there, did we?”

“Err, yes, as a matter of fact…” Ffeldy grimaced and brushed the ash from his eyes. As he struggled to form a less inane response, Fieuzz made some gesture that involved both hands clamped over her mouth. “I mean,” stammered Ffeldy, “that, uh, where I’m from, we believe that plants have feelings and that talking to them…umm…makes them more delicious.”

Fieuzz mimed tightening a rope around her own neck .

“Oh, I see,” continued Barrow through a menacing smirk. “But I’m confused. If you’re from The Grove, the only place I know where plants have feelings, doesn’t that make you some sort of cannibal?” Suddenly Barrow froze, his face paled. The stub of cigarette dropped from his fingers.

“What is this?” growled a low, resonant voice. A blast of hot air hit Ffeldy between the shoulder blades. Fieuzz ducked her head back behind the tablecloth, and Ffeldy turned slowly on his stool to where Barrow’s eyes were locked. The enormous feline face of a male charr glared him down from barely a pot-handle’s length away. The charr had snuck up on silent paws—how long had it been there, listening? Neither Ffeldy nor Barrow said a word. Both stared as if hypnotized as the charr’s nostrils flared, then exhaled another hot blast of air into Ffeldy’s face.

“You don’t smell familiar,” snarled the charr. “We have not been introduced. I’m Head Chef Raspy, and by the smell of it you’re my Seraph delinquent du jour.” Raspy narrowed his eyes. “Barrow, you worthless chunk of sirloin, I know you’ve been into my Ascalonian seasoning again. You’re on coal duty in the under-cellar. Now. So move your tail.” Barrow withered under Raspy’s glare and fled for the door, but the charr continued to snuffle at the air. “And I also smell a telltale waft of cordite laced with Maguuman vanilla. Which can only mean there’s an asuran engineer hiding under my table.”

Raspy reached for the tablecloth, but before he could pull it aside Fieuzz parted the fabric like a diva emerging from a theater curtain.

“Yes, and what of it, charr?” she chirped angrily before Ffeldy could react. “If only the specialized receptors in your cytoplasmic ion channels had my brain’s level of transmembrane potential—or perhaps if you could actually read—you’d know that there’s a _ten gold bounty_ out for me. I’m armed, dangerous, and I shall call upon the Eternal Alchemy to carbonize your atomic framework just before I show you the business end of my PWNR—“

“Shuuuut….uuuuppp!” mouthed Ffeldy.

The charr’s thick brows lifted in surprise. “Professor Fieuzz? Is that you? You great big bluffer.”

“—and I shall program Mr. Pickwick to inscribe an alchemagical distal asphaltization that shall frictionalize your metacoiff—what’s that about bluff? I? Never!”

“Don’t you remember me, Professor? I took your class—Advanced Hydrolic Explosives, I think? You were on some sort of exchange to the Black Citadel. I sat in the back, auditing classes since I didn’t have no cash back then. Aye, it was against the rules, but I got so good with elixir S that I was either invisible, or tiny, or soaked with so much stability they couldn’t have thrown me out with less than three guardians. It was the old-school elixir S.”

“So, you’re an engineer too then, Head Chef?” ventured Ffeldy, while Fieuzz stared silently with a puzzled expression—the first Ffeldy had ever seen on her.

Raspy huffed and flattened his ears. “Don’t you stop skinning those taters on account of me standing here, hairless cub. Unless you want me to skin _you_.”

Ffeldy retrieved his peeler and started peeling at double speed.

“Aye,” sighed the charr, “it’s been awhile since anyone addressed me as such. Engi Raspy, ahaha. I suppose my training has served me well as a master chef—I was always good at elixirs. Here Fieuzz, I have a gift for you, since you’re still giving me the stink-eye like I’m some sort of Clement Forktail—“ The charr caught himself and glanced at Ffeldy. “Begging your pardon, human. ‘Traitor’ is what I should have said, instead of that Ascalonian slang.” He pulled a red and gold bottle from a pouch on his belt and handed it to Fieuzz. “Take a whiff of this Elixir S now. That’s home brewed.”

Fieuzz uncorked it dubiously and sniffed. “Invisibility _and_ stability? They don’t make it that way anymore.”

Raspy nodded. “Keep it. There’s plenty more where that came from. But that ain’t all. I have a knack for architecturing. Which reminds me…Fieuzz, matey, let me show you something that’ll convince you I put those classes of yours to good use. (Not you, human, those taters won’t peel themselves.) Don’t worry. This is my kitchen, and no Seraph is hauling no fellow engi off to the clink, even if I DO work for them. (That also don’t apply to you, human. Your neck is not my problem.)”

Fieuzz scowled. “After my misfortunes of late,” she said at last, “I am loathe to trust anyone but the most naïve of humans. You may claim to be a fellow engineer, yet I can’t help but speculate over the unfortunate circumstances that bring you to a basement kitchen in one of the most technologically-backward lands of all Tyria.”

“I should ask you the same,” growled Raspy. “But it’s a fair question. You see…” He lowered his voice, and Ffeldy had to cup a hand to his ear to catch his next words. “…I have made a certain ‘lifestyle choice’ that is not exactly compatible with charr society. Even the more liberal sylvari have banned me from the Grove. Only humans, curse the hairless lot of them, open their doors and employ me, as there are a surprising number of likeminded, eh, partakers here. Including,” Raspy whispered, “Thackeray himself, and he hired me. Though that’s a state secret.”

“No!” gasped Fieuzz. “I never imagined. A massive, hairy, rough, sharp-clawed brute like you. And you’re—"

“That’s right. A vegetarian. But never mind. Come, take a look at my pièce de résistance for the banquet tomorrow night.”

Ffeldy stole a glance over his shoulder. Chef Raspy drew aside a curtain that portioned off part of the cavernous kitchen. There stood a massive, multi-tiered cake. Construction was still ongoing, as assistant icers and fondant-molders balanced on scaffolding—a few were even suspended from the ceiling—adding their finishing touches.

As Ffeldy suppressed a gasp, he overheard Fieuzz say, “Well, if it were anyone else I’d be amazed, but I’d expect nothing less from an engineer.”

“Thanks, Fieuzz. I drew up the blueprints myself. It’s a perfect scale model of Divinitiy’s Reach, though I exaggerated the height of the palace by eighty percent to give it that towering cake effect humans seem to, haha, eat up. The flying buttresses are sugar. My own recipe personal recipe optimizes the crystal structure for strength. It don’t taste too bad, neither.”

Somewhere on the far side of the kitchen, a bell rang.

“Oh, sorry,” said the chef, “you’ll have to excuse me for a moment. That’ll be my tray of crème brûlée.”

As Ffeldy rocked in his chair for a better view, Head Chef Raspy buckled on a face mask and shouldered a heavy liquid-filled tank. The charr raised a brass nozzle attached to a hose.

“Attention, kitchen!” thundered the chef. “Fire in the hole!” A gout of flame spewed from the nozzle, illuminating the underground room in a hellish light. Ffeldy shielded his eyes. “There,” growled the chef. “Caramelized to perfection.” With his claws he pinched out one flaming whisker. “And it’s the best use for a flamethrower I’ve found yet.”

“Psst. Fieuzz!” whispered Ffeldy now that the chef had become distracted in the plating and garnishing of the desserts. “You said you could help me out of my, umm, predicament?”

“Of course I _could_—in ordinary circumstances,” replied Fieuzz. She’d stolen one of the crème brûlées and was surreptitiously shoveling spoonfuls of the dessert into her mouth before anyone else noticed it missing. “But as my own situation is most precarious, I would require nourishment at regular intervals—"

“Done.” Ffeldy waved his hand at the kichenesque expanse. “Obviously.”

“—a place to sleep (could I borrow your cot? There’s comparatively less risk of _you_ getting brain damage sleeping on the stone floor), hard cash, weapons, armor, tools, books, assorted raw materials and a few globs of ectoplasm. Once I have those things, I can solve your problem is three femtoseconds. Make that two and a half.”

“Oh.” Ffeldy was glad he hadn’t let himself get too excited about any quick, fortuitous outcome. “Guess I’ll just enjoy a nice final view of DeGlasse and Kai and Captain Thackeray and some visiting asuran official, all smiling real friendly-like, when the rope is tied around my neck…”

“Visiting asuran official?” Fieuzz snapped. “Why didn’t you say something earlier? Any indication as to _who_ this official is?”

“Well…” Ffeldy wracked his brains, which he honestly didn’t think were quite as insignificant as Fieuzz liked to suggest. “Captain Thackery just said that he—no, she—was the assistant to an assistant of some Arcane Councilor…”

“Assistant to an assistant? Are you certain?” Fieuzz’s cackle sounded like a pulley that needed grease. “How very droll. I know precisely who she is. Not only do I bear a certain resemblance to her, I also have access to a certain amount of…we’ll call it blackmail. Oh yes. I can do something with this. Brilliant!”

For a moment Ffeldy mistakenly assumed he had just been complimented, and grinned.

“_This_ is why I am a certified, card-carrying genius!” Fieuzz placed her goggles over her eyes. “If all goes well, I shall see you at the ceremony tomorrow. Until then, don’t do anything brainless that might draw attention to yourself, like running away. Trust Fieuzz, ETS 342. I always have everything well under control.” She sprinkled liquid from Raspy’s small red and gold bottle over her head, and disappeared. Only a strange-smelling puddle of pink liquid remained.


	11. Chapter 11

_This was a triumph._

_Test Subject three-four-two: SUCCESS!_

_Who’d have guessed it from a Krytan human?_

_Incingergen Science ™_

_Where ethics are just an afterthought._

_My lab was banned from Metrica_

_And now my krewe are all dead._

_But to social pressures I refuse to succumb,_

_And I’ll keep on testing, though you think that I’m scum,_

_Still my research gets done, and I’ve made a neat gun,_

_Called the PWNR – I know you want one!_

_I’m not even crazy._

_My doctor assures me that I’m sane_

_(despite not living through our last encounter.)_

_What does it matter?_

_Test Subject three-four-two is mine._

_He may not be all that bright_

_Compared to me—but who is?_

_All these sheets of data, they are beauty to me,_

_And I need an income because golems aren’t free,_

_With three-four-one subjects burned_

_Think of all the things I’ve learned—_

_PWNR’s the best gun that’s not Legend’ry!_

_Go ahead and hate me._

_Call me an Inquest traitor scab._

_Where would all you gear-heads be without me?_

_Maxed out at Masterworks?_

_That was a joke, Bookah, fat chance!_

_You want your Ascended gun_

_And I will make you the best._

_TS three-four-two shall obey my every whim_

_Just remember me, and be glad that you’re not him_

_For alchemagical advances we must learn to take our chances_

_On our few Test Subjects who survive!_

_And believe me that he is alive._

_My Krytan human T.S. is alive._

_And I’d be sad at this point if he died._

_What is this confusion I feel inside?_

_Why should I care if he is still alive?_

_Still alive…_

_Still alive?_

_~ scribbled in a research notebook recovered by Seraph guards from a cache along with 250 globs of ectoplasm, orichalcum, mystic clovers, and a defunct golem named Mr. Pickwick._

* * *

Ffeldy stood staring at the spot where Fieuzz had vanished. “Wait a minute,” he exclaimed. “Head Chef Raspy, if she could use that vanishing potion, I don’t see why I couldn’t, too. I could use it now, or wait until the ceremony and use it to sneak past the guards…please, you’ve got to give me just a tiny vial!”

The massive charr turned on Ffeldy, hackles raised. “I repeat, young cub, that YOU are not an engineer, and I owe you nothing. First, it is an elixir, not a ‘potion.’ Second, elixirs are not to be used as cowardly exits from situations—they are ‘tactical’. And third, if your neck means that much to you, maybe it’s time to take matters into your own hands. Just saying.”

“I could put some sort of sleeping potion—elixir—in the soup and—“

“There will be no messing with the soup on my watch! Step away from the food. I think I’ll put you on place-setting duty up in the Great hall. I believe we need five hundred and sixty-three sets of silverware, and the same of placemats. The carts should have already arrived. That should keep you occupied until tomorrow night.”

“Tables for over five hundred people?” Ffeldy was stunned. No more than a score of them would be the families of the recruits, and he knew his own mother wouldn’t be there as she had a farm to run. Maybe a few more attendees would be lower-ranking Seraph who had been “volun-told” to attend so that any visiting dignitaries wouldn’t feel slighted if the audience proved too meager. “Don’t the citizens of Divinity’s Reach have more exciting things to do than goggle at a few barely-trained kids?” he asked.

“Oh, aye,” said Raspy in somewhat better humor. “That’s normally so. Usually one- to two hundred is a good recruit dinner. But leaked word of an execution brings in the meta-forkical ravens. The only spectacle bigger than that is Balthazar’s Balls. (Though no omnomberry pie in the world would induce me to cater for that skit-and-hylack show.)

“Oh, of course. My neck. Once again, that explains everything.”

# # #

As Ffeldy checked the spacing of the knives and forks with the tape-measure Chef Raspy had grudgingly lent him, he heard a faint sound like the rustle of curtains. He paused to listen. A nearly imperceptible movement of air tickled the back of his neck, as if a bird had swooped past his head.

“Is anyone there?” Ffeldy thought he heard a soft, stifled laugh. Suddenly something cold and blunt pressed into the base of his spine. “Gahh!” He spun around. Dominick stood there smirking.

“Just practicing.” Dom spun a butter knife expertly in one hand. “But you’re too easy of a target. No fun. At least show a smidgen of self-awareness.”

Hot anger built up in Ffeldy’s chest like steam until he couldn’t contain himself. “I’m working here!” he shouted. “Don’t tell me you’re after the silverware, too! I’d report you to Raspy, but I don’t much care anymore.”

“Here for the silverware?” Dominick put on an exasperated air. “Why on Tyria would you think that?”

“You’re a thief.” Ffeldy eyed the butter knife. “Give that back, please. You’re messing up measurements.”

“I’m not ‘officially’ a thief until tomorrow.”

Ffeldy pressed his palms into his forehead as if the action might incite his brain to work faster. “Why is the Krytan government hiring thieves into the militia? And then letting them stay on as thieves? I thought you were a thief when you stole things, but once the government…I don’t know, _arrests_ you and puts you into a reform Seraph program, isn’t that the point when you stop being able to call yourself a thief?” He lowered his voice and whispered, “Either that, or it’s a mighty corrupt government we’re working for.”

Dominick grinned. “Queen Jennah is a mesmer, but just imagine if she’d have claimed her profession as thief. Riots, I tell you. Bonfires in the streets.” 

The thief—it wasn’t possible to think of Dom otherwise—thumbed a crease from the lapel of his coat, and Ffeldy noticed how different he now looked since their forest march together, barely over a week ago. Dominick had cleaned up well. Possibly too well. He had tied his now-gleaming black hair back with a satin ribbon, and the addition of the leather Seraph uniform jacket in place of his old rags gave him the deceiving air of respectability, even authority. The female recruits sometimes even turned their heads in unison when he passed them by between training sessions.

Ffeldy managed to laugh in spite of himself. “You. Getting me in trouble with DeGlasse. Trying to kill me with a butter knife. I thought we were mates.”

“Of course we’re mates.” Dom held up the butter knife by the blade. “Now give me a better fight than the last one.”

“I don’t have time for this. Fight? I don’t want to fight you. Mates don’t fight.”

“Yes they do. It’s called sparring.”

“No. Do you realize how late it is? I have to set at least a hundred more tables. Besides, it’s all…pointless.”

“What, you mean this?” The thief eyed his blunt-tipped butter knife. “And I thought you’d be glad. I got the dull one just for you.” He faded into the shadows before Ffeldy’s very eyes.

“How am I supposed to spar with you when I can’t even see you?” A tray heaped with silverware sat on the table next to Ffeldy. As the hair on his neck began to tingle in anticipation of another knife attack—friendly or not—he dumped the silverware on the table. Spinning in the direction of where he thought he heard the faintest footfall, Ffeldy ducked, thrusting the tray in front of his chest and face like a shield. With a loud _sssshhhhinggg!_ the rounded knife tip jutted through the center of the flimsy brass tray. Dominick materialized in front of Ffeldy, his hand grasping the hilt.

“Better,” said the thief. “Good use of intuition.”

“You mean, lucky guess.” Ffledy pulled the damaged tray free. “You have a knack for vanishing. How does that work? Do you use a potion—elixir for stealth?”

Dom gave him an odd look. “I’m a thief. I’m stealthy. I do…stealthy things. You might say it’s one of my core competencies.”

“Huh, core competencies. Right. So…do you blend into your surroundings like a wild animal? Walk in the shadows? Could I somehow train my eye to see you coming if I know what to look for?”

Dominick cleaned his fingernail with the tip of the knife. “No, no, and…no.” For a second he flashed a diabolical set of white teeth.

“Well that’s hardly fair.”

The thief shrugged. “That’s why we spar. You hone your ‘intuition’, and I get to feel overpowered when I make beginners like you cry. You’ll get better.”

“If I do cry, remember it has nothing to do with you. As for getting better, I have a…very limited time.”

“Well I didn’t bring it up. By the by, Miss Karkasonne sends her regrets. Well, I suspect she would if she could. DeGlasse caught her trying to contact Hoelbraek with some sort of carrier owl and sent her to her quarters without any supper. I know she wanted to see you. But that reminds me. I have something for you. Here.” Dominick reached under his coat and handed his friend a bundle wrapped in brown jute cloth. “Maybe this will help buy you a little extra time tomorrow.”

The thief waited expectantly, hands in his pockets, while Ffeldy unwrapped it. “What in the name of all…” Then at the sight of what he held in his hands he hastily wrapped it back up and tried to give it back.

Dom stepped back, hands raised, grinning. “Keep it, I insist. A little…creature told me that adjustments have been made to improve survivability by fifty percent. So now you have a one out of two chance to survive firing the thing.”

“Do you WANT to get yourself killed along with me? How did you get your hands on...? Oh right. Thief.”

“You’re catching on.” Dominick winked. “Now go do some PWNing of your own.”

# # #

The recruits lined up by height, shortest to tallest, and so Ffeldy found himself smack in the middle, just behind Johan the “bear whisperer”.

“If he doesn’t get ranger, I’ll eat my chainmail shirt,” Kai mouthed as found their places. “Though I’ll do the same when they make me a mesmer,” she added. Kai, of course, as the only recruit of norn descent, found herself all the way in the back.

Ffeldy shifted uncomfortably. He’d stuck the PWNR in his belt, at the back where his coat would hide it, but he could still reach the grip, assuming the trigger didn’t catch prematurely and set his lower half on fire. He’d lain awake all night trying to come up with a plan to use it that didn’t involve some sort of suicidal mass casualty disaster, but nothing else short of going quietly to the gallows had come to mind. Oh well. Maybe Fieuzz would return as promised. Or maybe not. The asura did not seem the most trustworthy of sorts, and maybe sending him the PWNR was her concession to him. Maybe she was testing him, to see if he actually could think for himself.

The regimental Seraph band struck up a march tune in the Great Hall.

“Get ready,” hissed DeGlasse to the recruits lined up in the hall outside the main door. “I’ll lead my group around to the left. Ms. Fiero will lead hers around to the right. We’ll meet again on the far side facing the dais. When I raise my hand, you’ll turn to face me, and stop on my command. Ready? Left, right, with the music, and…forward!”

Phantasmal the white fox had been curled around DeGlasse’s neck like a fur ruff. Now he leapt to the floor and raised his banner-like tail. He set off at the head of the procession in perfect step, as if he’d done this a thousand times. Which, in all likelihood, he had.

As the recruits entered the hall at a slow processional march, there was a ripple of polite applause. Even setting hundreds of table settings hadn’t prepared Ffeldy for the sight of hundreds of actual people. As he marched forward in his column he scanned the faces of the crowd. Had they noticed him? Were they staring? But no. While the crowd watched the recruits with interest, they didn’t seem focused on him in particular. That wouldn’t last much longer.

The marching columns snaked around the perimeter of the room, then met again in the middle, centered before the dais. DeGlasse signaled the recruits to halt. Although the dais was empty, the mesmer saluted toward it anyway, and the recruits followed his lead. No sign yet of Captain Thackeray or any asura, Fieuzz or no. To one side of the dais Ffeldy spied a table laid out with all manner of tokens—face masks, colored jewels, fancy helmets, amulets and other trinkets. And, to one side, a noose.

“Greetings, citizens, denizens and Krytans,” bellowed DeGlasse in his Drill Sergeant voice which he’d modified slightly, placing within his usual audible sneer with an extra dollop of pomposity. “I’d ask you to lend me your ears, but as today I’ve set aside my sword for a more ceremonial staff, I’d have to pull them off with my bare hands. Obviously, that would take too long.”

This generated an uproar of laughter and table-thumps from the seated audience.

“If you’re attending this banquet,” continued DeGlasse, “You know that despite our fancy armor and rather enormous responsibility to Queen and Kryta, most of us Seraph are a vile lot.”

More applause.

“The as-yet absent Captain Thackeray excepted, as always.”

A few whistles and stomps. “The EVER absent Captain, more like!” shouted an anonymous voice from somewhere in the back.

“And if ever you were a Seraph recruit that came though my training camp, then you’re the vilest kitten-sons and -daughters that ever defiled the city.”

Massive cheers. Ffeldy overheard Kai mumble, “K-word this, k-word that…the man has the dirtiest mouth I’ve ever heard.”

DeGlasse waited until the crowd settled. “But they don’t hire me to give the speeches around here. If his eminence the Captain found out I was wasting this many words on you lot, he’d tell me I might was well dance for you kittens, too.”

“Dance for us, Glassy!” screamed an anonymous young lady in the wings. “We love you, Glassy!” screamed someone else.

“So I’ll just step aside,” said DeGlasse as if he hadn’t heard, “and hand Master of Ceremonies over to someone the people do pay to speak at these kitten events. Plus, she’s much nicer than I. The Hero of Shaemoor, Miss Atalanta Fiero!”

“Thank you.” Atty stepped forward and the hall fell to a hush. She wore a flowing, flame-red dress so shimmery that she appeared to be on fire. Chairs creaked as the audience shifted forward in their seats. “I understand this is an unusually packed event. While I’d like to assume that you all showed up for the speech and our world-class Divinity Stuffed Mushrooms…”

Ffeldy glanced at Kai. She wrinkled her nose and started to mouth _what a goody-quaggan_, but the seriousness of Atalanta’s tone caused them both to pay attention.

“…we all know that is not the case. You are all here because there is a noose on the awards table, and you’ve come for the spectacle. But that’s just human nature, isn’t it? This morbid curiosity?”

Now the chair-creaking—even the audience’s breathing—seemed to have stopped. Ffeldy lowered his eyes to the floor and prayed that no one was looking at him.

“There’s a strange myth here in Tyria that all of us are born with the wonderful gift they call ‘potential.’ If we can dream it, we can do it. We all play hero as a kid, and that’s what we think we’ll grow up to be. But then drought takes the family farm. Money is gambled or drunken away. We get drafted into the Seraph, when all we wanted was to—collect butterflies. I wish there was room for five hundred Heroes of Shaemoor. I’d rather it was anyone but me. But I was there at the right—or wrong—time. And so it goes.”

Atalanta released her grip on the dais podium and someone passed her a glass of water. Ffeldy stole another glance, this time at DeGlasse. The mesmer sat to the side with his arms folded, a thin smile on his face, as if he’d written her words himself, or maybe wished he had.

“There is one of us here today,” continued Atty, “who will not leave the ceremony alive.”

Murmurs of speculation rippled through the audience. 

“A part of me wants to apologize to that individual. Perhaps I’m to blame. Perhaps your failure was also my failure.”

Muffled shushing and whispers of “quiet!”

“But let’s not speculate. Let’s not compare my advantages to your disadvantages. If you fail, it isn’t because of some unfortunate gods-given circumstance. It’s because you gave up. I merely pushed. Prodded. My touch may have been more steel than silk, you may think me cold, but I behave this way because…you’re better than you think you are. I can’t believe in someone who has no belief of self. But you need to start. Now. No one else will do that for you. It’s nearly too late. But maybe…not quite.”

Ffeldy at first didn’t look up from the neck of the person in front of him, and when he did, Atty had already stepped down from the podium. The crowd was awash with anxious whispers, And Ffeldy didn’t even notice the drink cart trundle by until Kai slapped a goblet of something into his hand.

First was the invocation by one of the priests of Grenth:

_Death is messy, Death is cold,_

_You have to leave behind your gold._

_Armor rusts, glaciers melt,_

_When the hands of Grenth are felt._

_But lest dark thoughts disturb out mood,_

_Let’s drink like hell, and pass the food!_

“Line back up, quick!” Kai said. “They’re about to start the official toasts. Though I don’t think we’re allowed to eat until Captain Thackeray and his retinue arrive.”

Just as Kai had predicted, they did indeed have to stand and give increasingly ridiculous call-and-answer toasts while, just inside the wait-staff doors, a line of food trolleys awaited some secret signal.

“To the Order of the Seraph, which protects, defends, and only occasionally harasses the people of Kryta at home and abroad.” “To the Seraph!”

DeGlasse refilled his glass and glanced at the doors, then the hourglass on the table nearby, which had stopped flowing. He turned it over and raised his glass again.

“What’s going on?” whispered Ffeldy to Kai.

“Oh, he can’t proceed any further in the ceremony until Captain Thackeray arrives and we can toast to him in person. So we’ll just keep toasting more and more esoteric things until he shows. Happens all the time.”

“And if he doesn’t show?” Ffeldy knew he shouldn’t get his hopes up, that doing so always backfired, but couldn’t quite help himself.

“He will. But we may be toasting for most of the night. I hope your bladder is good and empty. Things could get uncomfortable.”

“To the ministry’s guard, whom we can assume protect and provide security to the nobility, but which they can neither confirm nor deny.” “To the guard!”

There was a sudden commotion near the main entry doors. Whispers began to buzz around the room like restless wasps. “The Captain, he’s arrived!” “Thackeray is here! But does he have a murderous look in his eyes.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Author's Note: The song at the beginning of the chapter is a parody of "Still Alive" from Portal. In case you wanted to do a cover version or whatever. ~I.I.~ ]


	12. Chapter 12

_Fear not boss fights_

_Tell the foe: “Bring it on!”_

_Just do your best_

_Worst case, you’ll respawn_

_Your armor can be repaired—_

_Learn to spar wearing just underwear_

_Death’s just a dodge roll away_

_Boss’s health is still up all the way_

_Rising epic melodies_

_Evoke warriors in us all_

_Show those bruises proudly_

_Brush yourself off and stand tall_

_Rebind all your combat keys_

_Research builds and craft some ascended gear_

_Forty tries and much chagrin_

_Don’t give up, someday you’ll win_

_Practice and you’ll get it right_

_You’ll soon solo any fight…_

_-excerpt from an epic ballad attributed to Skaald Fearin of the Wayfarer Foothills_

* * *

Captain Logan Thackeray burst into the room, his orange Crusader greatsword glittering on his back, clutching a pile of paperwork as tall as a haystack in his arms. Loose parchment pages escaped his grasp to flutter around him, giving him the aura of Kormir, goddess of order and truth, filing her taxes the day they were due. Aides scampered behind the captain, gathering up the fallen papers.

Somewhere in the balcony, an unseen orchestra ceased their light dinner-hour background music and struck up an epic melody complete with a choral arrangement. Captain Thackeray’s equally epic black hair fluttered behind him like a battle flag. Without a word, he tossed the heap of papers onto the VIP table elevated on the dais.

Apart from the balcony orchestra, the room grew hushed and tense. Captain Thackery strode over to the awards table and glared at the noose lying among the other class trinkets, looking like he wanted it to burst into flames. Only Ffeldy noticed the tiny, hooded Asura who had entered quietly behind the captain and, with some trouble due to the size of the chair, seated herself at a place at the VIP table marked “Asuran Ambassador” on a little card. Fieuzz winked at Ffeldy, and he winked back, surprised at how relieved he was to see her.

Meanwhile Captain Thackery turned to view the crowd. “Fellow Krytans,” he began, “it has come to my attention that while We have been focused on obvious outward threats to our nation—centaurs, undead, dragons—we have mostly ignored a more invisible, insidious, but just as fatal internal threat.”

He paused for emphasis. Ffeldy’s breath hitched as his heart skipped a beat, certain the captain was elliptically referring to him.

But the Captain instead gestured to the unstable pile of paper behind him. “In Kryta these days, it’s the heroes with the big swords who our young people most want to emulate. Zhaitan may soon die, if the Six will it, but still many ancient, obsolete laws remain on the books. Laws that approve expensive engineering contracts to conglomerates in Rata Sum and the Black Citadel, while suppressing scientific research at home. Laws that”—here he fumbled for a page from the table behind him and scanned it quickly—"laws that box people into professions based solely on aptitude, but not preference. And in some cases, lead to a promising young person’s untimely death.”

Ffeldy eyed Kai over his shoulder. She had tucked her shoulders back and was listening in rapt attention.

“I’ve come here today, as Captain of the Seraph and Krytan representative of Destiny’s Edge, to declare war not just on Zhaitan, but on obsolete laws and snarls of bureaucratic red tape that send the bravest of clerks screaming. I wear my armor to the office, not just the battlefield. And I’m no less a hero for it.”

The crowd cheered, knocking over chairs with their standing ovation, but Captain Thackery silenced them with a twirl of his hand. He turned to his mountain of papers.

“I brought these files with me as a visual aid to give you an idea of every piece of paper I could find regarding regulations that put me in our present conundrum. To wit, the impending death of a young man who, for all my research into possible loopholes, has run low on options.”

“Have Queen Jennah change the laws!” shouted someone from the peanut gallery. “Or are you two not on speaking terms anymore?”

Captain Thackeray turned a wry grimace in the direction of the speaker. “I just left an audience with her, but thanks for the concern. She’s as eager to update the laws as I am. But this isn’t something that can be done with a snap of her fingers. There are bills to write, councils to convene, votes to collect. The wheels of a legal renaissance have begun to spin, but that may take months. And Von Ffeldy doesn’t have months, he has an hour at most. Speaking of the lad, where are you, Von Ffeldy? Come up here and stand by me.”

This time Ffeldy’s pulse stuttered to a stop, then skittered back to life in the space of an instant. He stepped forward, aware that every eye in the room was on him, and put on what he hoped was a warrior’s expression. No, not warrior. Engineer.

“You see all this paper, Ffeldy?”

“I’ve been staring at it for the last ten minutes, sir.”

“This is every last page I have personally read through, in search of a way to spare your life in keeping with the law. Because”—his voice broke suddenly—“because I like a success story.”

Ffeldy, who all last night in his restless dreams had been kicking the Seraph Captain in the head, softened suddenly toward him, even if all these Seraph types took the letter of the law far too seriously. “I appreciate that, sir. All I ask is for a chance to prove myself.”

“I’m glad to hear it. Because there is one tiny loophole.” Captain Thackeray passed him a parchment and pointed. “It says right here: Beat the Champion in single combat, and the queen, via a representative (me) will let you enter any profession your heart desires.”

The crowd rumbled at this pronouncement, and the orchestra, which had lowered the volume during Captain Thackeray’s speech, rose again with an ominous crescendo backed by a martial drumbeat.

Some loophole.

Ffeldy steeled a voice with an edge he didn’t know he possessed. “The Champion. So, like the cave troll the Bandithaunt caverns, or the Shadow Behemoth that appears in the Godslost Swamp every few hours?” He tucked his hands behind his back so no one could see how they shook. “A solo fight. Very well. Let’s do it.”

Captain Thackeray gave a dry laugh. “That’s the spirit. But not so fast. I didn’t mean any champion. I meant the queen’s champion. Me.”

Now Ffeldy understood why the captain’s complexion had gone ashen. “Fight you. Like a duel?”

“Some might call it a duel. Here we call it…PvP. Are you willing to take your admittedly slim chances at defeating me?”

“Definitely,” said Ffeldy without hesitation. It crossed his mind that the captain would make his death quick and painless, at least. Then shoved that thought away. Even if he didn’t stand a chance, he was going to show off the few skills he had before the end, as best he could.

“Are you sure? I’m fairly renowned for my PvP prowess. I first met Queen Jennah when she spectated an arena match in Lion’s Arch, and impressed her enough that she hired me.”

“Don’t forget the part where you got knocked senseless in the fight!” shouted someone from the audience.

Logan glared up at the peanut gallery.

“It would be an honor to go against you on the field of battle,” said Ffeldy quickly. “You seem like a worthy fighter.”

“You say that now,” said Captain Thackeray darkly. “But when I PvP, I turn into a monster. And I will not spare your precious feelings.”

Ffeldy removed one of his torn leather gloves and tossed it on the floor. “Then let’s get this over with.”

Amid the crowd’s collective gasp, tables and chairs were pushed were pushed to the perimeter of the hall to create room for a makeshift arena. Chef Raspy’s stuffed Divinity mushrooms hadn’t been forgotten, however, and food was passed around the room to be eaten stadium-style, with bare hands.

“Who’s your second. Ffeldy?” asked Captain Thackery amid the bustle, just before his aide Lieutenant Groban dragged him off to his corner to get ready.

Ffeldy glanced wildly around the room, his eyes alighting on the first friendly face. Fieuzz.

“She is.” He pointed at the asura who, in the commotion, had disappeared along with the VIP table and popped up at his side.

“A genius choice,” said Fieuzz with a toothy grin and steered him to the opposite corner of the arena. “Let’s get you ready to hemorrhage his quasi-photon cerebral waveforms to the sentience level of a sea sponge.” She pushed him into a chair and started pulling his arms into the sleeves of a long leather coat.

“Shouldn’t I put on some of the Seraph practice armor?” he asked as she buttoned him up.

“Engineers do not wear metal armor, my dear ETS. I may not have a single copper to my name, but I bought this from a karma vendor. It should fit you nicely. And it makes you look a bit more…what’s the word humans use? Badass.”

He looked down as he fastened the coat’s wide leather belt. She was right. Plate armor made him look ridiculous, and silken magic robes weren’t much better. Suddenly he looked more like…and adventurer, which was exactly what he’d always wanted, he just hadn’t realized it until now.

“I put a few random tools in the pockets,” added Fieuzz with a mischievous grin. “A good engineer is creative and can improvise. I look forward to seeing what you do with them.”

Suddenly he found himself surrounded by friends.

“Feldy!” panted Kai, pushing through the crowd with a Divinity stuffed mushroom in each hand. “Maybe it’s not the best pre-duel food, but it’s better than nothing. Should boost your precision anyway, and I think you’ll agree with me that you need the help.”

“Thanks,” he said, and stuffed an entire mushroom in his mouth. While he chewed, Atalanta the Hero of Shaemoor appeared before him in a dazzle of flame-colored skirts. She pressed something round and metallic into his hands. At first he didn’t recognize it, then realized it was the lens from his sister, the only possession he’d brought from home. It had been polished and fitted with a leather strap.

“I hope you’ll pardon my presumption, Ffeldy, but when you first showed me this back in that closet in Fort Salma, I had no idea it was a…a…”

“Panscopic monocle,” cut in Fieuzz. “Obviously. Required facial equipment for any engineer, even the bookah ones." 

“Right. What she said.” Atalanta tossed her hair and continued with her usual gravitas. “Your asuran friend here enlightened me…”

“Understatement of the year, silly human,” mumbled Fieuzz, and Ffeldy grinned.

“…and I took it to a specialist’s shop to get a tune-up. They added the strap and everything. I hope you like it.” And she placed it over his eye, fastening the strap at the back.

Ffeldy blinked. The single lens flickered, then lit up his vision with indicators, arrows, a crosshair in the center. His own portable heads-up display.

“How do I look?” he asked Atalanta hopefully. “Badass?”

She crinkled her nose. “Umm, I would say smarter?”

Even Chef Raspy turned up, despite how busy the kitchen must have been. “You’re starting to look like a bona fide engineer cub,” he admitted. “Here, add these to your arsenal.” He handed Ffeldy a small flask marked Elixer S, and a large silver trowel, the kind used for serving cake slices. “Think of this as your “oh shit” button,” Raspy said to counter Ffeldy’s confusion, extending a claw to the cake server. “If you’re worthy of joining us geniuses, you’ll figure it out on your own. Break a leg, kid. I gotta get back to the kitchen. When I’m done with my crème brulee you can borrow my flamethrower, too.” He tousled Ffeldy’s hair and was gone.

“Hey, future champ-trouncer.” Now Dominick appeared from thin air in his stealthy thief way, holding Ffeldy’s shield and the PWNR. “Don’t forget your weapons. I did that once, was messing with my inventory, drew some aggro from a centaur and couldn’t equip anything. I must have run in circles, thwacking the dang beast over the head with every plank, rock, and broken bottle I could get my hands on until it finally died of exhaustion.”

“Thanks for the tip.”

“Seriously.” The thief took Ffeldy’s hand and shook it vigorously. “Best thing you can do is go invisible for about ten seconds, wait till he forgets your there, then hit him with everything you’ve got. If you can run away, great.” He stepped back and thumped his chest in salute. “It was an honor to know you.”

A herald proclaimed loudly “The match starts soon!”

“Quick,” said Kai, wrapping Ffeldy in a lung-busting hug. “Let’s get you to the starting point.

Ffeldy stood on one end of the hall, and Captain Thackery, his armor freshy shined and his hair brushed out, stood on the fair opposite end. Sergeant Deglasse, meanwhile, was drawing a chalk circle on the floor large enough for an average human—Kai excepted—to lie inside without touching the lines.

“Alright you kittens,” said Deglasse, straightening up. “Let’s go over some rules, aiight?”

Captain Thackeray raised an eyebrow at being called a kitten, and Deglasse flushed scarlet all the way to his hairline.

“I try to kill him while he kills me, right?” asked Ffeldy, but Fieuzz elbowed him in the ribs.

“If you don’t have your A, B, C and D strategies worked out already, ETS 342, you should probably warm up your handful of precious brain cells with a light stretch. Can’t have you straining neurons during the match, can we?”

“Since these are PvP rules,” continued Deglasse with surprisingly less profanity, “you will play single node conquest. Whoever doesn’t die, or holds the point long enough to reach 500 points, wins.”

“Some duel,” muttered Ffeldy under his breath. Kitted out with an engineer’s equipment, incomplete though his outfit was, felt more comfortable to him than sixty pounds of sword-stopping iron plate. The PWNR pistol balanced nicely in his grip, and on his arm his shield buzzed and flickered. It was the same hunk of metal he’d salvaged off a skeleton in the troll cave, but Fieuzz had apparently done some tinkering, and added a built-in energy source. He suppressed the urge to sit down and take everything apart to see just how it worked. He’d have to win this fight first.

“When I said to think, I didn’t mean you should lose yourself in your head, 342! The match is about to start, and I have a lot riding on you. A massive bet to buy a new golem, yes, but also…I want you on my krewe. I admit I thought you were a bit of a drip when we first met, with the brains of a badly harvested clam, but…now I have these horribly incoherent FEELINGS that don’t bear any logical analysis whatsoever—"

“…three…two…one…begin!” heralded the herald.

Ffeldy snapped back into the present and ran for the point in the center of the room. Captain Thackery sprinted in from the opposite direction. He beat Ffeldy to the point and stood with a shimmering bubble of shield over him.

“Come at me, you noob. Too scared to take a potshot? I’m right here, point blank. Think you can hit the broad side of a barn? Fire away, you kitten.”

From the corner of his eye Ffeldy saw Kai gasping at Captain Logan Thackeray himself uttering the vulgar K-word.

“You really are a monster when you PvP,” muttered Ffeldy to himself. “But I’m not stupid enough to let you taunt me into firing at a reflective shield.”

The captain’s shield flickered out. Ffeldy fired from the hip. An arc of purple electricity shot out and struck the captain in the face. He raised his hands to his eyes, stunned and blinded for a second, long enough for Ffeldy to improvise his next move. He jabbed with his shield. A force wave knocked Captain Thackeray backwards, and he stumbled away trying to regain his balance. Ffeldy leapt forward onto the vacant circle, shield raised defensively.

“What are you doing?” shrieked Dominick from the sidelines. “It’s called DPS! Damage per second. You’ve got to fillet him, not knock him about like you’re beating a rug.”

“You do your thing, thief,” said Ffeldy breathlessly, “and I’ll do mine.”

“And what is your thing, if it’s not DPS?”

“To be as annoying as kitten.”

Just then Captain Thackeray came charging back to the point, sword drawn. Distracted by his chat with Dominick, Ffeldy didn’t have time to toss his elixir S (invisibility AND stability!). The captain sent him flying backwards with a force wave of his own. Ffeldy rolled, came up on his knees and threw up his shield just in time to bock a wave of rough attacks that jarred all feeling out of his arm.

Captain Thackery stood on the point and laughed out loud.

Ffeldy raised his pistol, centered the crosshairs in his monocle head-up display, and fired a few darts, but they had no visible effect. He changed hands and fired a gout of flame instead. Better, but the captain beat out the fire in a few seconds and seemed none the worse for wear apart from a few singes on his armor. If only he had a flamethrower…he looked about for Chef Raspy, but couldn’t see him. Ah well, time for a new approach. He thrust a hand in his pockets to see what Fieuzz had left there for him. He found he rather enjoyed improvising as he went. His hand closed around a large electro-magnet, like the kind he’d used to move iron nails about as a boy, though many times bigger and more powerful. Just the thing for the Seraph Captain’s massive metal breastplate. But the captain was just waiting for him to repeat the shield-blast tactic from before, ready to stand his ground this time. Good. Ffeldy would use it against him.

Sure enough, when Ffeldy raised his shield arm, the captain shouted, “stand your ground!” Ffeldy blasted the shield for good measure, being sure to look disappointed when this time Captain Thackeray didn’t budge from the point. He fired a few more harmless shots, just for the look of the thing.

“Hey kitten!” taunted the captain. “You just keep on trying. Everyone gets better with a decade of practice. Pew pew!”

Ffeldy said nothing, just waited patiently for a few seconds, then raised the electromagnet to activate it. This time the captain shot forwards in Ffeldy’s direction and nearly landed in his arms. Ffeldy pulled out a prybar—another of Fieuzz’s random assortment of tools—and rapped him soundly on his head. The captain’s metal helmet rang like a bell, leaving him spinning with confusion for a full five seconds. Ffeldy meandered onto the point and, at the moment Captain Thackeray recovered enough to charge, he tossed his elixir S and raised his shield. This time he held firm.

Pausing after his failed rush, Logan thew his dented helmet aside and shook out his glossy black hair. “I’ve been far too easy on you, noob. Lieutenant Groban, fetch my level 80 dragon finishing stake. I’m going to need it in a moment.”

With that he disappeared, only to reappear as a whirling, sword-clad form in Ffeldy’s face. Ffeldy could feel himself melting under the attack. During what he was sure were his last few breaths, he managed to swig a mouthful of his elixir S. Suddenly he found he’d become a toy-sized version of himself—was he even supposed to drink this stuff?—and escaped by dashing between Captain Thackery’s massive metal boots.

A few seconds later, having returned to his normal size, Ffeldy dropped to one knee, his endurance spent. Captain Thackery advanced on him, sword swinging, with a manic PvP-induced twitch in one eye.

Ffeldy fired the lightning wisp from the PWNR one last time at his assailant’s eyes, to buy himself an extra fraction of a second to think. He shoved a hand in his pocket and pulled out Raspy’s cake trowel. His oh-shit button, if he could figure out how to use it. Cake trowel went with cake. Instinctively, he glanced about for the cake. There it stood on it’s own platform at the far end of the room, a towering scale model of Divinity’s Reach made entirely of sugar. Or was it? Each of the cake’s towers had an oddly familiar shape. In one last burst of energy, Ffeldy ran away from Captain Thackery, tossed a box of nails that scattered on the floor behind him, and made for the cake display.

“You think you can kite me, kitten?” howled the captain, hot on his heels. “Feel my wrath!”

Ffeldy skidded into the cake display just as the captain’s blade met the nape of his neck. Wielding the trowel like a dagger, he struck the base of the cake with all his might. A great shudder ran through the massive edible structure, and a crystalline tinkle of cracking sugar work. Then the whole thing shattered on the ground like a toppled pyramid of wine glasses.

To be precise, all the cake and sugar fell away, revealing three massive metal turrets that had been holding up the structure.

“One supply crate, as ordered,” said Ffeldy brightly, and turned to face the captain. Behind him he heard a whirring of gears. Then a net shot out of one turret, catching and holding Captain Thackery fast.

Ffeldy dashed for the point. He could see on Deglasse’s scoreboard—conjured out of thin air with pink butterflies—that the score was close, and if he could just stand on the circle a little longer—

He dove headfirst for the point, fully expecting Captain Thackery to tackle him from behind and hurtle him bodily over his head. It didn’t happen. He hauled himself to his feet just as a gong sounded, signaling the end of the match. Deglasse sauntered over, squeezed his hand, and raised it in the air. Ffeldy had won.

Captain Thackeray approached, having finally freed himself from the net turret and batted out a few flames from the flame turret cake-supply crate, and Ffeldy braced himself, readying another dose of Elixir S. But instead the captain extended his arm with a wide grin.

“Good game, well fought,” he said cheerfully, like an entirely different person. His eye twitch had gone. “It’s a true joy to spar with a challenging opponent. Let’s do this again sometime.”

Ffeldy offered his hand in return, and the captain pulled him in to a manly backslap-hug.

“Not bad for a noob,” the captain whispered in his ear. “I didn’t go easy on you for a second.” He released Ffeldy and continued at a normal volume, “I can think of a lot of places that could use a man like you. The mists, for example, are a veritable playground for amateur battle tacticians. And I have this Sylvari friend—acquaintance—Trahearne, he’s always looking for smart assistants to go out and battle Zhaitan minions. He might take all the credit for himself, but he’s a good old bean, haha, and pays decently. Your friend Atalanta there, she’s agreed to help him out in Orr. There will be plenty enough work for the two of you.”

“The three of you, is what I think you mean, Captain Thackeray.” Kai butt in between them and put a protective arm around Ffeldy’s neck. “Because I’m going too, as soon as I defeat you, captian, in this battle called PvP, and win my right to permanent guardianship—”

“Oh, Kai, you don’t need to get all martial with me,” said Captain Thackery brightly. “I saw your mother today in court, along with your father.”

“My…father? From Holbraek? He’s here?”

“Somewhere in the audience, yes, both of them. Turns out your norn blood waives you from the Seraph test results after all. He was babbling about spirit animals, I didn’t quite catch the exact gist, but you’ll be made a guardian tonight at the ceremony. Which reminds me, I need to get this show on the road!”

And with that, Captain Thackery hurried away to whip his team of junior Seraph officers into efficient action.

The profession presentation ceremony spun by Ffeldy in a glowing sunny haze. He stood on his chair and cheered for Kai when she put on her new guardian’s helmet on stage, and gave a two-finger whistle when Dominick accepted his thief’s hood. When it was his turn, the Seraph lieutenants exchanged embarrassed glances. They had no engineer tokens to hand out, and no one was going to hand him that noose (which had disappeared from the table at some point in the proceedings). Then Fieuzz came to his rescue from her seat on the dais, and handed him the PWNR.

“I concede that my high hopes for this phalange-worked necroblastic ruinator are slightly dashed,” she said sheepishly. “The basic attack mode has the lethality of a buzzing fly. We might have to find you a rifle instead. In fact,” she added in an undertone, leading him off the stage to a quiet nook by a window, “I’m about to slip out into the night, collect my winnings, and find a more fugitive-friendly locale. Perhaps I’ll go study in Amnoon, in the Crystal Desert. And should my favorite surviving test subject ever wish to come find me, he will be most welcome to join me in my scientific pursuits. There’s always a place for you on my krewe.”

“And what will you study in Amnoon? Just curious.”

“Asked like a true engineer. Excellent question, excellent indeed. Have you ever heard of a holosmith? Why am I even asking. Of course you haven’t. Your species has barely achieved object permanence…” Fieuzz trailed off. “I’m sorry. I continue to insult you and your kind left and right. Call it a defense mechanism for my own personal insecurities if you will, but there’s no excuse for it. Anyway, holosmith. Remember that word, and in a few years when things have settled down, Zhaitan, Mordromoth, all that epic ridiculousness that I really want no part of, you look me up. Promise?”

“I promise.”

Fieuzz reached up and pinched his cheek. “You really are the most adorable human I’ve ever met. But I hate goodbyes. If I stand here any longer, I’ll turn into a sobbing, sentimental Charr.”

And with a toss of her own Elixir S, Fieuzz disappeared.

“So,” said Atalanta, approaching from behind. “I don’t think this party needs us any longer. Shall we go pack our bags for Orr?”

Ffeldy turned to see her, Kai, and Domenick standing behind him.

“Maybe we shouldn’t rush off to Orr so fast,” said Ffeldy slowly. “I want to seek out some other engineers in the Black Citadel and Rata Sum, to see what I could learn from them. Plus I could use a bit more combat training, we all could, really. Maybe we could do a little traveling first, then head to the mists for a week or two. We’ve almost got enough people for a team. We could extend an invite to that ranger with the bear, Johan. Start our own guild, build up some resources…”

“Of course the engineer is thinking logistics instead of how to increase his DPS.” Dominick laughed. “Which you still need to do, by the way. All the crowd control in the world won’t make a dent in Zhaitan’s scaly face.”

“Duly noted,” said Ffeldy with a grin. “It sounds like a fun research project.”

“Let’s go!” Kai gave an out-of-character girlish skip. “I can’t wait to see all the vistas in Tyria!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The song at the beginning of the chapter is (rather obviously, I hope) based on "Fear Not This Night" by Jeremy Soule. Again, cover versions would be most appreciated! A writer can hope, right?
> 
> Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this story. I'm currently working on a sequel, and shall post the chapters as I complete them. Thanks for reading :)
> 
> ~I.I.~


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